


Aim to Fire

by WaldosAkimbo



Series: Aim to Fire [1]
Category: Guardians of the Galaxy (Movies)
Genre: Betray me once shame on you, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, My First Fanfic, Parent Yondu Udonta, Peter is kidnapped, Pre-Guardians of the Galaxy (2014), betray me twice you get an arrow in your eye, hitting things, learning things, some kragdu like barely, teaching things, yondad at it again
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-12
Updated: 2017-06-26
Packaged: 2018-11-13 08:30:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 10
Words: 29,687
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11180937
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WaldosAkimbo/pseuds/WaldosAkimbo
Summary: Peter Quill goes from Cargo to Ravager. And perhaps it isn't the dad we've always wanted, but the bullet holes we gather along the way.It's Kid Peter, it's Yondad, it's grumpy Kraglin, and some odd bunch of Ravagers. Also, Peter getting kidnapped (again) and Yondu havin to go all badass and save him, I s'pose.





	1. How Come

“Quill! Come ‘ere,” said Yondu from the entryway. He’d had a harebrained idea and before it went whistling out of his skull and into nothing, he figured he’d try something different. Had to make him useful sooner or later, ‘fore the men decided he really _would_ make a good meal.

Quill was slumped down in a pile of rubber tubing. They kept the stuff stocked in one of the supply closets, nothing fancy, the whole mess covered in an old tarp. Built it up like a regular nest by then. Quill kicked his foot out to get a better view, betraying his secret hiding place with an errant foot. There was a perfectly good bunk in his quarters, his _own_ quarters, too, which was a damn privilege, but the Terran always squirreled away in the closet, like he _enjoyed_ garbage. Regular junker.

“How’d you find me?” Peter asked.

“Boy, you think I don’t know my own ship?” Yondu snapped back. “Every nook? Every cranny? Yer a damn fool if you think I didn’t figure out where you was going. Now, I said come here. I wanna show you somethin’.”

“How come?” Peter asked from his nest. He pulled the orange foam earpiece down around his neck and clicked off his Walkman, giving a bit more of his attention. He wasn’t completely dismissive of the Centaurian. Not yet.

It was only a few weeks after he’d been picked up by the aliens—abducted was the word for it, that was for sure—but they didn’t go find Quill’s father. That had been the first thing Yondu said to him after he set him down in the bright spotlight, Quill quivering and crying, snapping his head around at the strange noises. The bright light from the heavens. Peter thought his dad had come for little Star Lord just like his mom promised. If he was a being of pure light, Peter was standing in it. There were some barks, some clicks, little flicks of a big blue hand and he blinked back, trying to focus on anything. Quill didn’t understand. He squinted despite his black eye, his cheeks puffy, his throat raw from screaming back at his mom. His mom. And then, just the thought of her made him well up more, his whole face screwing up into a mess of angry tears.

“Take my hand, Peter,” she had said, rasping for air. It had been right there. Right there! Peter looked down at his own hands, ignoring everything around him. He let them come into focus before he looked up again, expecting someone like him, but older. Instead, stepping into the bright circle of light was a stocky blue man in a long red coat. He loomed over Peter. Maybe it was just the fear pickling his brain, but he was a giant! A monster! That weren’t his father. It couldn’t be! And then the big blue guy jabbed a piece behind Quill’s ear, this little sticky bit of metal that bit into his neck, and suddenly they were all speaking the same language.

“—tell him we’re taking him to his father, all right?” said the blue man. “He don’t need to know. Neither do the others. Hey, there we go. Don’t go scratching that, neither. You’ll pull it out and scramble yer brains. You hear that, Boy?”

Quill heard. He heard and he looked up then, calm, quiet, his breath catching a little in his chest. It was like a whole new world was switched on. Peter looked between the blue guy with his crisp red eyes and the greasy man beside him. Two adults. Two _strangers_. Peter nodded between them, hiccupping once as he ran his forearm under his nose. The blue one stepped back and then Quill leapt after him, wild. He started biting at anything soft and vulnerable he could find. Chomped down on a blue hand and started pummeling and kicking. The other guy, the human-looking one with a long stringy Mohawk and a few blue bruises on his lip, a greenish looking welt stamped on his eyebrow, hooked Quill up under his armpits and pulled. Soon Peter was swinging his feet. There was no traction and the pull on his arm sockets started to hurt, so Peter went limp.

“You got some teeth, Boy,” said the captain as he wrung his hand out next to him. “Y’see that? He broke skin!”

“That he did, sir,” answered the other man. “Don’t know if it’s advised, but we could just take _out_ his teeth.”

“I like yer thinking, Krags.” Then the Captain got down on Quill’s level, his mouth peeling back in a cocky, shark-tooth grin. “How’s that sound, huh? You want we should yank out yer teeth? Could give you a set of chompers good as mine.” Then _he_ chomped _his_ teeth, once, twice, to make his point. They were sharp and fangy and at least two were coated in metal. Real villainous teeth. Quill flinched back into the gritty hands of his captor, flailing just once before he settled again. The tall human-looking one was strong. Had a tight grip on him. It all seemed pointless then. The whole fight started to melt out of him as he realized this was it. “Thought not. ‘Sides, ain’t no way we can get you new Terran teeth now. We’re practically across the galaxy from that place. And we can’t go and harm the cargo, Kraglin.”

“Shame,” said the other man, but he let Quill go. Almost dropped him too. The man called Kraglin was tall. Like, actually tall, now that Peter got a good look. And he was young too. Not, well, not _young_. Not a _kid._ There was some patchy stubble on his smooth face, right there with the bruises and cuts. That Kraglin guy liked to get into fights too, it seemed. He looked down with his big dark eyes and gave Peter a gentle push over towards a bunk set in the wall. “Got some blankets in there, too, if’n yer cold.”

“You said.... C-Cargo?” Peter managed to get out at last, stumbling a little.

“Don’t worry ‘bout that, Boy. Listen, get in that bunk, shut yer eyes, and we’ll be back on the Eclector ‘fore you can say ‘Who’s yer dad,’ alright?”

“Who is—”

But this time the Captain put his hand on Quill’s shoulder and nudged him on over to the bunk again. Right as he reached the mattress and his shin bumped a hard metal shelf, he felt something prick his neck again, right next to the little translator implant. It was almost like a mosquito sting and then he was out like a light.

 *

Life changed pretty quick from there. Peter didn’t wear any colors, no flames, but he stayed on the ship and was always close by Yondu or Kraglin when there was anything to do. Not to learn, ‘course. They weren’t going to teach him jack. But he cleaned what they told him to, he kept his eye on everything, he picked up a few tricks for the nav systems when he was on the bridge. Sure, he slipped up a few times. Dropped parts. Got in someone’s way. Got a boot to his back more times than he could count. So he threw a few punches, got in some scraps. He could fight.  Maybe he couldn’t fight with _aliens_ , specially some of the really big guys. They threatened to eat him _seven times_ in a week! With their giant flapping mouths, Peter thought they really could eat him and he shook in his too-big-boots every time someone threatened him.

But sometimes he was tired. He was _tired_ of all the aliens, the weird, the new. He just wanted to listen to his music, please, just a little bit, just to remember his mom’s voice and hold his hand up over his eyes, not _crying_ or anything, but just thinking about it. That’s when he found the closet. Once the eight cycles were over when he was supposed to be scrubbing the bridge or following Tullk around the bulkhead or tightening screws on the bridge, Peter would find his closet and curl up on the rubber tubing. It was comfortable. It was dark. And, most important, it was _quiet._ Peter didn’t think anybody knew about it. He’d never once been interrupted when he hid there, going through his tape a few times before he crawled out and returned to his bunk near Yondu’s quarters.  

Since he was so tired and emotionally stretched, Peter let it slip out. “How come,” he had said, not thinking, just saying it like that. “How come?” It looked like it went over with Yondu about as well as he’d expected.

“How come?” Yondu asked. He turned, hands on his hips as he blocked out the light from the corridor. He didn’t threaten it, but the Yaka arrow was visible and Peter kept an eye out for the familiar red flash atop the Centaurian’s head. “A captain tells you to do something, you don’t say ‘how come.’ You say ‘Yes, sir.’ How come my ass. You a part of this crew or _what_?”

“No,” Peter shot back. He was already in up to his neck, why not just swim straight for the deep end already. “I’m not!”

“What’chu say?”

“I’m _not_. Yesterday you said I was _cargo_. You always said—”

“Oh, hells with that ‘cargo’ shit,” Yondu answered, waving the sentiment away. He squinted into the dark room, his red eyes aglow. “We may a picked you up from Terran for a snack, but you ain’t cargo. Now, getcher ass up outta there ‘fore I say so again. I’m gonna teach you something.”

“Teach me? What?” Peter asked, squirming out of the garbage.

Once he was up, he grabbed the raggedy flannel that had been his uniform since he’d been abducted. There was an old black sweater that smelled like crude oil that Kraglin shared with him, but that was about it. Yondu said, as soon as they had time, they’d outfit him with something proper. Until then, Peter was gonna have to make due.

“Teach me what?” Peter asked again as he trailed behind.

“Don’t ask again, son, or I'll change my mind,” Yondu growled over his shoulder, stomping on the grimy grated floor down towards the hangar.

Kraglin Obfonteri was lounging in a mostly empty hangar bay, minding his own with his feet propped up on a dead control panel. The thing was on the fritz after Scrote decided to pull out all the wires one drunken evening and make himself a wig, trying to prove a point. What that point was, neither he nor Scrote could rightly remember, but they figured they’d repair the thing before anybody got wise. Kraglin was propped on it then as said reminder. There was a cold metal bowl resting on his chest, propped there with one hand as he slurped up some blue fowl thing into his mouth. He was humming around each bite while one of his feet was twitching to an audio file buzzing from a thin earpiece pressed up to the side of his head, clipped into his earlobe by a coppery wire. He’d replicated the songs from the Terran’s mix tape. That little Walkman was Peter’s life and Kraglin came up with the idea of copying the music, just in case something dire were to occur.

“Wouldn’t want you to lose it or nothing, hey, Pete?” Kraglin asked, talking nice and slow as he knelt down in front of Peter who had his knuckles sucked up to his mouth like his teeth might fall out. Two of them already had. Yondu thought his threat had come through by sheer force of will, but the Doc informed him that Terrans had a second row behind their first and it was just pushing them baby teeth out of the way. Nothing crazy like the rows of teeth an A'scavarian might have, but still. “And, see?” said Kraglin. “It’s all good. How’s that?”

Peter had snatched his tape back with quick greedy hands. He was faster than Kraglin expected. That was a good sign. The kid was going to have to be quick out in space. Quill turned the tape over and over, peering at it up close and personal like, reading every spec of it, every scratch, every ding. He was practically reverent of the thing. Kraglin’d done good by ripping the audio files.  When Peter slid the tape back into his Walkman and tentatively placed his headphones back around his head, he just about burst at the sound that came through, as clean and clear as it had been back on Terran.

“See?”

“Thanks, Kraglin,” Peter said breathlessly.

Kraglin almost ruffled Peter’s hair then. Almost. He’d never gotten particularly close to the cargo before. There’d been no need, of course. All of them who’d passed through were with them a couple of cycles. But Peter wasn’t…Kraglin didn’t think of it, that’s what. He knew Yondu didn’t need to be reminded, so he just took that weird little sentiment and clamped it down by chewing the inside of his cheek. He clapped his knees and stood up, whistling a pathetic Ravager tune as he went back to his duties.

Nobody had asked him to. Nobody said Yondu was coming by with his Terran, but Kraglin had put on the audio file and was just then tapping his toes gently to Blue Suede Shoes, like it was the most natural thing in the galaxy. Then his captain came up on him and barked out “Kraglin, my M-ship ready? I’m taking us down to Mondar for a bit.”

Kraglin didn’t skip a beat. He just slurped on his ration and asked, “How come?”

“How come?” Yondu repeated back.

Peter giggled.

“Oh, y’think that’s funny, then, huh? ‘How come?’ I hear someone ask me ‘How come’ one more time, I’m blowing all the airlocks outta this place!”

Peter swallowed and put on a straight face. Yondu slapped Kraglin’s feet off the console and grabbed his rations, chucking them clear across the hangar where the metal dish clanged against an M-ship. It bounced off as harmless as a flea. More harmless, maybe, since fleas bite and that metal bowl didn’t do shit.

“Hey,” Kraglin whined, but was quick to acknowledge his captain’s anger. “I mean. Yes’ sir. Straight down to Mondar. You, uh, you lookin’ for something particular, or this just a scouting mission?”

“Target practice,” Yondu said, making sure to enunciate every letter with vicious, biting precision. “And get Umber and Zu up here, too. Could be good to have a few extra hands.”

“Extra eyes, I s’pect,” said Kraglin.

“Ain’t that why I asked for ‘em?” Yondu snapped.

“Yes, sir, Captain.”

Kraglin pumped his fist against his chest, two strikes, before he went off and made quick work of his start up procedures. He prepped the nearby M-ship. It’s bright hull gleamed in the low hangar lights and despite the dings, the fire burns, the grease, it was as beautiful as ever. Yondu stood center stage in the hangar as his man got everything ready, waiting for the two octolops to scurry up from their shift in the engine room. Peter waited nearby, watching Kraglin work, admiring how Yondu made anyone step in line.

“What’d you mean about target practice?” Peter asked, pinching at the end of his sleeves and balling them into his fists before he wrapped himself up.

“Mean what I said,” Yondu answered. He nodded and ducked under his ship, helping with the fuel line. He touched the small of Kraglin’s back, nodded at him and flicked his head back. Kraglin didn’t smile, exactly, but there was a little crinkle in his eyes as he scurried on over.

“What’s he mean about target practice?” Peter asked, trailing after the lanky Xandarian. “Kraglin? Should I be worried?”

“Always, Pete,” Kraglin answered in his offhand way. He had skipped over to the other side of the hangar and rummaged around in one of the crates. He finally grabbed what he was looking for and dragged it out, shaking it a few times. “Here it is. Hey, take this.”

Kraglin presented a tough red leather jacket. There weren’t any flames on it, not on the sleeves, certainly not on his chest where a ranking officer might keep his. The kid hadn’t earned that yet. But it was the same tough leather that the other Ravagers wore. Same stitching. Same rusty red. Kraglin held it up again, nodded at the size of it, and tossed it over to Peter without ceremony. It was too big. It gapped on his shoulders, went down past his fingertips. His neck was swimming between the lapels. But Peter’s mom said he was always growing so fast. He could hear her say it then. He could feel her gently touch his face and say, “You’re getting so big, baby. Won’t be so little anymore, Star Lord.” Peter worked a lump out of his throat. He wished, for a moment, that he could show her his cool new jacket and tell her about all the crazy weird things he’d seen, but the thought just burned in him and made his stomach hurt. Yondu was already in a mood, neither dark nor joyful, and Peter wasn’t sure what would tip him one way or the other, so he decided to swallow his feelings and stand aside.

The octolops, Umber and Zu, were twins that they’d picked up from a raid out near Haderfast. They were bipedal, sure, two legs, two arms, thin skin that was dark and streaked with red lines. Peter didn’t know if the lines were just how octolops looked or if they were tattoos like Kraglin had all over his chest. But they had eight eyes that blinked up and down their foreheads and a beak that looked like it could tear out Peter’s throat without trying. Neither of them had threatened him. Not to eat him, not to fight him, nothing. They were quiet, but Peter still took a cautionary step back, putting some distance and a well-placed Yondu between him and the aliens. Yondu may be blue and a mean sonuvabitch, but he had just the two eyes.

“How you feel about going off ship to keep a lookout while I teach our youngest here how to shoot a blaster?” Yondu asked the octolops twins. He asked as a kindness, really. They were quick to pound their fist to their chests in a two-thump salute before they ran over to help Kraglin under the heavy latch of the grav-line couplers. “See that? That’s how you do it, Boy.”

“They didn’t say ‘sir’ or ‘captain’ either,” Peter mumbled. Yondu looked down at him, his face in profile, his big eye peeking from a scarred cheek. Peter quickly added, ‘Can’t be translated, though, I guess.”

“Yer just not listening,” Yondu said. “That little translator chip we put in you doesn’t pick up their tongue. Not well. But it’s like Centaurian.” Yondu clicked something like a staccato command, three groups of noises. Three words, maybe. Umber and Zu turned back and waved. “Close enough. Accent gets in the way sometimes. But maybe they don’t talk to you cause you’re a whiny one-language speaking shit. You think of that?”

“No,” Peter mumbled. He’d been excited to get off the ship and learn something new, but now it seemed that the captain just wanted to verbally abuse him all day. He’d get plenty of that just doing his duties onboard. He wished he was back in his supply closet again.

“Don’t mope, son,” said Yondu, and clapped him on his shoulder. Usually it hurt. Yondu wasn’t gentle, he didn’t hold back as far as Peter could tell, but the red leather jacket helped take some of the blow and Peter only staggered a little. “You boys ready to go shootin’?”

“Yes, sir!” Kraglin answered, and the two octolops clicked something, giving Yondu another two-thump salute.

“Hey,” Yondu said, and shook Peter, patting him again before he led him over to the M-ship. “You ready?”

“Yes,” Peter answered, felt a squeeze near the base of his neck, and added, “Yes, sir.”

But as they climbed the plank up into the M-ship, Peter started to feel some of the thrill return. He hadn’t been off ship since they first took him from home. There were plenty of different species on the Eclector. Ravagers picked up anybody that was good at thieving and followed The Code, as Yondu put it. But Peter had never seen another planet besides Earth. He smiled, despite himself, and felt some excitement build in his chest as Yondu took his captain’s seat in the cockpit, Kraglin in his copilot and the twins strapped down behind him. Peter looked around, wondering where to go. He almost went and sat on the shelf where Yondu made him sleep when he was first abducted before Yondu snapped his fingers and told Peter to come over. He grabbed the boy off the ground without any effort and sat him there on his lap. Told him to hold tight as he punched in the start-up sequence and took the M-ship out into space.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh god this is the first time I've ever posted anything and all of this has been done literally a thousand times, but I just wanted to set it up before we take Peter to Target Practice and Things Go Wrong(TM).


	2. Target Practice

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Shooting trees and such is all fine and good, but you ask Peter to shoot an innocent animal? Well, that's not gonna fly.
> 
> Yondu tries to teach Peter how to use a blaster and it all sort've goes to shit, as these things do.

Mondar is, as with most of the moons out in this quadrant, a piece of shit rock infested with Orloni, just like the piece of shit rock Morag where they originated from. The whole belt was crawling with them. The Eclector had been fumigated every other month, but they just came back like tides in an ocean. They were, if anything, the proverbial cockroach of the galaxy.

And, just as it happened, Orlonis were great target practice.

Yondu parked them in a small clearing, a little grove cut out of the wide forest that captured most of the moon’s surface. Peter sat up on his lap, staring over the control panels at the wide view of the moon.

“It’s…” he said, a little breathless before he finally choked out, “It’s just like Missouri!”

“Ya sound disappointed,” Yondu said, starting to scowl.

“No! No!” Peter hopped off Yondu’s lap and scurried up the port-side window, pressing himself flat against the glass. “No, it just.” Even though he had his face smashed against the window, Yondu could hear some of the sadness creeping into the Terran’s voice. “It reminds me of….”

He was going to say “home,” sure as the central sun was hot. But he didn’t. Peter just stared out at the trees as they finished with their landing, securing the M-ship’s feet to the soil and bouncing their coordinates back up to a nav team on the Eclector. Everything looked so much like the forest outside Peter’s home, the one where his mother would take walks with him and tell him all the stories of his father, the angel that came down from the stars. Course he’d never _really_ believe it, but his mom always called him Star Lord and he held onto that name tighter than he did his precious Walkman. Peter sniffed and blinked back any tears he might have let slip out if he wasn’t careful.

“Alright, boys, let’s go.”

Yondu released the hatch and the air hissed as atmosphere began to leak into the ship. Peter had a brief fear that the air would be toxic, that it’d burn in his lungs and he’d fall to the floor dead before anybody could help him. He started to hold his breath as the Ravagers sauntered back down the plank, Yondu clicking over at the octolops twins. But it was a passing fear, because Peter couldn’t hold his breath forever. He gasped, sucking in big mouthfuls of the rainy, ozone flavored air. Kraglin had waited at the edge of the ship and watched him with a careful eye, the edge of his mouth twisted up in a knowing smirk.

“You comin’, Pete?” Kraglin asked after Quill caught his breath.

“Yeah, yeah,” Peter answered, and jogged after him. “What’re we shooting anyhow?”

“Nothing, ‘till you learn everything there is about this blaster,” Yondu answered and slapped a big u-shaped tool against his chest. “First, we’re taking that apart. Then, we’re putting it back together. And _then_ , after I’m sure you won’t cook yer own flesh with it, I’ll let you shoot.”

“Really!” Peter squinted his eye and held up the blaster, focusing it on a nearby tree before Yondu clamped down on his arm, squeezing Peter’s wrist until it hurt and he let go of the blaster.

“What I just say, Boy?” Yondu asked in his raspy voice. “You best learn now, you aim to fire. This ain’t a toy, son.”

“Okay,” Peter said, twisting his wrist to get free. But Yondu held on a moment, staring him straight on until Peter finally stopped squirming. He looked up at the captain and, solemn as he could muster, he said again, “Okay.”

“Alright.” Yondu dropped his hand. He flicked a thin metal rod with a sharp hook towards Peter’s head, who ducked in time and watched it sail by. “Now pick that up and bring it over here. Yer gonna need it to get the kerrim bolt out.”

Yondu gave two curt commands to the octolops twins, jerking his head towards the trees and making a quick swirling motion with his finger pointed at the ground. They nodded and went off to do whatever the captain had ordered them to do.

It seemed to drag on forever as Yondu and Kraglin stood over him, shouting out instructions on taking the blaster apart, putting it together, arguing on how best to load it and who was a better shot anyhow. Kraglin was only teasing, Peter thought, being a little more pushy now that they weren’t around the crew. And Yondu let him, which was maybe even more strange. They shoved at one another, picking up a piece and naming it, asking Peter to repeat, which he tried. He only got hit on the back of his head once when he prepped the blaster and almost sizzled Kraglin’s foot with an errant blast.

“Well, stop talking over each other!” Peter yelled. He sat down with a huff and crossed his arms.

“Don’t _pout_ , Boy,” said Yondu, rolling his eyes. He crouched down too and picked up the blaster, turning it over a few times. “You did that pretty quick. Show me one more time and then you can really shoot it, how ‘bout that?”

“Really?” Peter asked, hopeful.

“He does, I’m standing over by the ship again, sir. You know what? I’ll be _on_ the ship, how’s that sound?” asked Kraglin, holding his hands above his head like they had the blaster trained on him.

“Fine by me, Krags,” said Yondu with another roll of his eyes. “Check and see if we got any rations aboard, too. And keep one damn grubblin bowl for me this time, alright, ya toothpick.”

Peter made a face at the thought of a bowl of big wet pale pinkish grubs rolling over each other in a frenzy.

“Alright,” said Yondu, handing the blaster over. “One more time. Show me.”

Peter took a steadying breath, looked down at the blaster, and disassembled it without dropping anything. He didn’t have to fight with the ionized dual round crystalizer, he didn’t misplace the kerrim cross bolt, or have any other possible mishap. It came undone and he lined up the pieces in the dirt just like Yondu had showed him. The Centaurian looked on, nodded once, and told him to put it back together. Peter clipped it into place, one after the other after the other, until the blaster was complete. He held it out to Yondu who took it, twirled it once in his hand, and shot over Peter’s head. The blast left a smoking hole in the trunk of one of the trees.

“That’s good,” Yondu said and gave a big, toothy grin. “That’s how ya do it. We’ll start on a basic setting. Take it and try to fire through that ring I gave ya.”

“Okay,” Peter said, just giddy as he took the heavy blaster back and pivoted on his heel, facing the tree that Yondu had fired at.

Kraglin made a croaking noise and went over to the ship, just as he promised. That meant that it was only Peter and Yondu out in the clearing. The wind was low, rustling through the pine-like leaves of Mondar’s forest. Peter squared himself, feet planted, and he lifted the blaster up with a straight arm, holding it with both hands as he focused on the spot. He started to close one eye like he’d seen in movies back on Earth when Yondu crouched down next to him.

“Both eyes,” said Yondu, lining up Peter’s shot. “You close one and someone’s gonna come up on ya and brain you. And hold it like this, see, steady it with yer left there so it doesn’t buck. It will, yer a damn twig, but it’ll help with the kick. Watch out fer that.”

Yondu put his hand on Peter’s wrist then, holding it there, more gently than he had before. They both stared over at the smoking hole in the tree, trails of it wisping away in the wind. Peter breathed, imagined all the pieces he’d put together, their use. Everything Kraglin and Yondu had said over the hours or so they’d been on the moon. He looked at the hole, he aimed, and fired.

The blaster kicked back just as Yondu said it would, but because his hand was there to absorb some of it, the blaster didn’t shoot back and crack Peter in the nose. Peter dropped his hands and looked out, hoping for another set of scorch marks close to Yondu’s. It was hard to see but they were just barely there, grazing the left of the tree. Another hole bored into one of the trees in the distance. It was sloppy. The blaster had bit a crescent-shaped chunk out of the trunk. Another stiff breeze would knock it over any minute. Peter’s shoulders sagged at the sight of it.

“Hey, look at that!” Yondu said with a shout and clapped Peter on the shoulder. “Pretty damn close.”

“Close?” Peter asked and cocked his head. “No! I missed, see? It’s all the way over there.”

“Line yer sight up there, Boy, you’ll see it’s close, like I said. Come on, line her up. Right, just like that, ya square yer shoulders, okay, got yer eyes on the target and ya _feel_ it then.”

“Feel it,” Peter repeated back and took a steadying breath. “Just like the Force.”

“Sure,” Yondu said and shrugged. “Gonna have some force, I s’pose, but it just takes practice.”

Peter nodded and held the blaster just like Yondu showed him before he whispered, “I’m a Jedi.”

He fired again.

This time the shot zapped by the right side of the tree. It _was_ closer; singed some of the bark next to the Yondu’s shot. Peter watched it sizzle away and shook his head before he lined it up and shot a third time, blasting a centimeter or so below the target.

“Hey!” he said and spun around, smiling from ear to ear. “Did you see!”

“I saw, son,” Yondu said and felt himself grinning right back. It was damn infectious to see the Terran light up. “Not bad. But that there’s not a moving target. Won’t be pillars and walls yer aiming for in a dog fight.” Yondu cupped his mouth and shouted back at the M-ship parked nearby. “Hey! Where them twins? I told ‘em to be back here soon as they could!”

“I’ll ping ‘em back, Captain,” Kraglin shouted from the open hatch of the M-ship.

“You got them fetching something?” Peter asked.

He’d lowered his arms so they might rest a little. The blaster was getting really heavy and he was afraid his arms would start to shake if he tried to hold it up longer.

As if on que, the twins came out of the forest, their arms laden with a mess of wriggling creatures. They looked at first glance to be hairless rats, almost scaly with big teeth snapping and their long tails hanging around Umber and Zu’s arms. Each octolops was carrying three Orlonis, which was no easy task. They nodded at Yondu, who waived them over and picked out an Orloni from Umber’s arms.

“There we go. And a nasty little bugger too. Ya see those teeth on ‘im? Getting’ real long. Betcha he’s sired millions a critters out there.” Yondu laughed as the Orloni squirmed in his grip, trying to get enough purchase so it could sink said long teeth into his hand. “And ornery too! This’ll work fine, just fine.”

“Fine for what?” Peter asked, looking a little pale. “You want me to shoot that thing? Yondu, oh my god, I’m not going to shoot a rat!”

“And why the hell not?”

“Because!”

“Cause _why_?” Yondu emphasized, leaning over the Terran.

“Because!” Peter said again and finally dropped the blaster. “I’m not gonna shoot it, Yondu, I swear. I’m not killing it.”

“What you think I had you learn how to shoot a blaster for? You think it was just to blast holes in a tree?”

“No,” Peter said slowly, drawing out the vowel as he started to inch away. He kept his eyes on the Orlonis in the octolops arms, looking more uncomfortable by the second. “No, I just. I don’t wanna kill it, okay? _Okay_?”

“Not okay,” Yondu said and reached for the blaster. He chucked the Orloni out in the field and blasted it before it hit the ground. The carcass splattered, leaving small chunks of burning flesh in the grass. Not much, of course; it’d been mostly blown away by the shot, but Peter could smell it and he gagged at the sight. “It ain’t that hard, Boy. Like I said, you aim to fire and you go and shoot it _dead_ ‘fore they shoot you. You best learn that _now_. You think anybody’d hesitate to _shoot_ you? Cause they wouldn’t. Hell, they’d _eat_ you without a second glance. You know that, Boy. So take this blaster and practice shootin’ one of these damn rats!”

“No!” Peter shouted.

He grabbed the blaster and threw it to the ground, even going so far as to kick dirt at it. He almost swung at the captain. When he did, Kraglin was coming out of the M-ship, running over to intervene best he could. Yondu had reached out to snatch Peter’s flailing arm but the Terran took off into the woods, his red leathers flashing on his back before that too started to disappear in the shade of the trees.

“Pete!” Kraglin yelled like a demanding parent after their spoiled brat of a kid. “Pete, y’best come back here and—”

“Ah, let ‘im go,” Yondu growled, looking down at the blaster in the dirt.

“But, sir, he—”

“Let it _go_ , Krags.”

Kraglin huffed, put his hands on his skinny hips as he watched the trail that Peter had taken into the woods. Mondar was a small moon. It’s not like he’d get _far_ or nothing. The first implant they’d put on him was a simple translator device, but the Doc had helped them upgrade Peter’s chip once he was onboard the Eclector and, with it, implanted a tracker as well as the biometric read. Yondu could pull him up on a data pad if they were real worried about him. Instead, he picked up the blaster and brushed it off with a slow, deliberate trail of his hand. Same one that Peter’d bitten, too. There was a tiny half-moon scar close to his thumb. Yondu looked at it before he clicked a response to the octolops, who dropped the litter of Orlonis and stepped back. Umber clacked to his brother, who helped herd them back into the woods.

“Shoulda shot the whole fuckin’ pack,” Yondu muttered, and headed back to the ship. If they were gonna wait for Peter to cool off, he was gonna eat.

“Shoulda shot _him_ ,” said Kraglin to the woods, but Yondu glared up at him and he bowed his head, offered a softer, “sir,” and followed him into the cabin of the M-ship.

*

Peter pumped his legs as hard as he could while running through the woods. He didn’t care if he smacked head first into a big ugly creature and got torn to shreds, as long as he was away from Yondu, the blaster, and the pack of Orlonis that he was meant to shoot. They’d done nothin’ _wrong_. They were just going about their lives when those stupid octolops boys picked them up and carried them off to their deaths. And Yondu! Yondu shot it! Without even looking! Peter skidded to a halt in the middle of another clearing. He collapsed to his knees, huffing for air. Was his throat constricting because he’d run? That’d never happened before. Maybe it was because he was on a moon and he just wasn’t as used to the air as he thought. Maybe it was because he kept replaying that shot over and over in his head, watching the Orloni explode in a mess of blue light and guts.

It was so, so _easy_.

Peter punched the ground. He closed his eyes, grimaced at the sight that played there, and punched again. And again. He started striking it with both his fists as hard as he could, pounding small divots into the soil. Again. Again. Again! A—

*

Yondu chucked his empty dish of grubblins into the refuse shoot where it was burned up on contact. Kraglin, lounging in one of the chairs nearby, watched his captain muttering to himself, something he never did on the ship with all the other Ravagers near. He was frettin’ over his little Terran. And it weren’t fair to see his captain fret. Kraglin nodded, chewing on a piece of rubbery grubblin before he reached over for the data pad, swiping through for Peter’s biometrics. He was about to flash it over to Yondu to show him it was all going to be fine when he choked on his spit.

“What’s up with you, Krags?” Yondu asked facing the refuse shoot. He gripped the counter until his blue knuckles were a frosty color. “Forget how yer tongue works?”

Kraglin stamped his feet back on the ground and started up the M-ship engines, punching commands as he rotated another screen near him, looking for the engine trail flitting away from Mondar.

“What the hells you doin’?” Yondu wheeled on him, grabbed him by the shoulder as he glared down at the data pad. “You tell me what got you so—”

“Peter,” Kraglin said and turned an orange display up towards his captain. “Peter’s gone.”

“Gone?” Yondu squinted at the screen. He gritted his teeth, clamping down so hard that Kraglin expected to see blood. “Shit. Shit! Who’s signature?”

Kraglin poked the screen until the ghost display of a warbird Haderfasti ship popped up. The bright colors burned in the display. “D’spar. They used one of their little bug snatchers to get to the surface. Didn’t see it from the air. That means…sir, y’don’t think that—”

“Think I do,” said Yondu and stomped out of the M-ship as Kraglin finished prepping it.

He whistled, low and sweet like syrup as the Yaka arrow twisted out of its holster and started dancing in a lazy arc around his head. When his foot touched the ground he whistled again through his teeth and the arrow shot out, zipping straight for Umber and Zu’s heads. The tail started to spark, driving it faster until it stopped short of their big black eyes.

“We picked you up from Haderfast, y’said you were the last ones left,” said Yondu, his fin rippling with red light. “Said you was _abandoned_ there. Whole place bombed to shit. And here I think a couple o’ orphans. Couple o’ strong boys like you. I bring you onto my _ship_. I bring you into my _crew_! Never had octolops here, but figured you stick to the Code, you do us right. But I know where your kind fall. And you led D’spar’s men right to us, didn’t you?” Umber grabbed Zu’s hand, shaking his head frantically as his twin shrank back. “ _Didn’t_ you!”

<<No>> Umber chirped, his beak clacking up and down. <<We didn’t do anything like that, we swear.>>

<<We never heard of D’spar. We’ve only known the Haderfast nest. We were but battle fodder then>> said Zu just as fast, wrapping his skinny little scarred-up arm around his brother’s. <<Before the explosion, they had us down in the tunnels. Said we had to run and get ammunition. We swear, Captain!>>

<<We swear>> Umber repeated. <<Sure the rest of the slaves had to be at the cannons.>>

<<The cannons. They were, they had to be. We swear>> said Zu, nodding. All eight of his eyes were glassy.

“You swear,” said Yondu and pursed his lips, his nose wrinkling uncomfortably. “You _swear_.” Yondu tongued the edge of his fangs, eyeing the shaking octolops. Then he growled a low mean threat of a sound before he whistled again. The twins jumped, shutting their eyes, but the Yaka arrow just zipped back into Yondu’s holster. “You wanna swear, you help me get that Terran back. Had you here to keep an _eye_ out! The hells you even good for!”

He raved, spoke to them in their tongue when he was tired of yelling, and herded them back to the M-ship. Umber and Zu scrambled over one another to get into the ship and there was Yondu, right on their heels like a fiery arrow.

“Get us back to the Eclector,” Yondu shouted as Kraglin tapped a button to close the hatch. The octolops twins, still wrapped up in each other’s arms, took a seat down below deck, afraid that if they stepped up to the bridge, the Captain would put the Yaka arrow through their eyes. “And have Nav get their sights on D’spar’s trail. That fuckin’ Haderfasti slave tradin’ jackass. They wanna steal from us? Thievin’ like that comes with a price.”


	3. You Ain't No Ravager

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Who is D'spar and what exactly does he have planned for the little Terran called Star Lord? It's not candy and play time, that's for sure.
> 
> Several aliens are coming into play now, so, have fun with some newbies before we return to the Ravagers whom we know and love.

There it was again. That bright spotlight. Quill felt himself slipping back in time, not more than a month yet. It was all a heavy déjà vu. He was quivering and crying, snapping his head around at the strange noises. His first instinct was not to look for his father, the angel, the bright light from heavens that his mother had promised. No. Quill blinked back hard hoping to catch sight of a familiar blue face.

“Tag him.”

The translator chip must still be working then, because Peter understood those words as easy as if they were back on Earth. But they didn’t come from anyone familiar. He knew he was in trouble. Peter wrapped his hands around the back of his neck, keeping it safe as he could as his eyes adjusted to the painfully bright light. He threw himself against a wall, trying to dodge the hand coming for him. Not blue. Not like he was expecting. And the floor underneath him weren’t the Eclector floor either. This was dull sheet metal. This was almost slippery enough that if he spun, he’d twirl around on his beat up sneakers like some poorly-balanced ballerina. Someone was behind him and hooked him in the familiar two-armed hold that Kraglin used, but they were stronger, much rougher about it. Peter swung through the air before he was slammed chest first into the ground and the wind knocked clean outta his little lungs.

Nobody had ever _body slammed_ him before. Peter was so shocked by it that, if he had air, he might just start sobbing right away. He wanted to yell for them to stop. It wasn’t fair. He was _eight_. He was a damn _kid_. Didn’t they know anything? But, then, this was space. And not even familiar space at that. Why did he even run away back on Mondar? Peter vowed, right then and there, he wasn’t going to ever leave the captain’s side. Not unless he really _really_ had to.

While he made his big internal vow, the alien pushed Peter’s hands away and reached underneath the collar of his Ravager coat. There was a painful zap down Peter’s backside as something was plugged into the base of his neck. It was big. Spindly metal spikes wrap around and sank into his collarbones, holding down like teeth. The whole thing wormed underneath his coat, unzipped down the length of his spine. Peter tried to swipe it away, but he was face down on the ground and he could barely catch his breath.

“Not so much for one of them gods,” said another voice. It was slithery, whispering out like venom. “Has he sent a price?”

“Two billion units,” said the first.

“Ah. So this one is cheap then. Mayhaps he won’t need all those limbs.”

“Don’t you dare,” Peter said through a moan. It was hard to talk with that weight on him. That “whatever” thing he’d just been attached to.

His hands were wrenched behind his back and clipped into place. Even as he struggled he realized the whole contraption went up and down his back, starting there at his neck and reaching down to his wrists, which were clapped together. It hurt to jerk his hands too far. He moved and the needles started to dig into his collarbones. There was already something wet spilling down his chest. Sweat? If he was lucky. 

“Don’t you dare,” he said again, desperate. He started to panic, gasping for air, but he held onto that fire too, that rage. The Ravagers weren’t going to leave him. Beat him, chastise him, grumble about him, sure. But they wouldn’t leave him. “You know who’s coming for me? Do you?”

“Yondu Udonta,” said the slithery voice. The name came across as a harsh, breathy sound and it reeked of rotting meat. “That disgraced Ravager? Not much of a threat.”

“Then you don’t have a clue.”

“High hopes, child, but you _ain’t_ no Ravager."

"Yes. I. Am." Peter fought to get any words out. All it earned him was another puff of that horrible smelling breath.

"I see a red coat, but I don't see any flames, child." The alien laughed and, when he did, it vibrated through Peter's trembling body. "So to say that your disfigured captain were to try anything is to say you have no cards to play. And, top of the list, you’re  _cheap_. Your payout is less than any of the others. If something were to…happen, well, it’d be easy to argue that you are just a bargain. So I would stay _quiet_.”

“You’re an idiot,” Peter said, gritting his teeth. “You’re scared! You don’t know. You don’t know anything. You’re scared and you’re gonna be in so much trouble, like, seriously. You’re gonna be dead! Yondu—”

“Shut him up,” said the first.

Peter was finally pulled up off the ground and stood face to face with an alien he’d never met. He had a wide, snake-like face that was split down in a line, almost like a nose slimy with mucous. The alien snorted at him before that snake face peeled open to reveal a large, toothy mouth. There were rows and rows of teeth in there, all of them sharp hooks like Peter might find on the end of a fishing wire back home on earth. The Haderfasti’s tongue, long and black, slipped out of his gaping maw and licked up Peter’s face. It burned on contact. A sizzling, smoking line started to eat away at his skin. Peter screamed then, thrashing to get away. He’d do anything to make it stop, god, please, make it stop! But the Haderfasti just laughed, reached around to Peter’s neck, and flipped a switch. The handcuffs tightened upwards, pulling Peter into an arc as he was quickly dragged over to a cell. The bars slid back and the Haderfasti shoved Peter inside, watching him beat his face against the floor as he tried to wipe some of the Haderfasti’s saliva away.

“We know who you rightly are, Star Lord,” said the Harderfasti and his mouth stretched again in a bad parody of a smile. “Too bad you won’t fetch us as good a price as we’d hoped. But it won’t be long now. Not long, children.” The Haderfasti spit, leaving a smoking divot in front of Peter’s face. “We’ll take you home soon.”

“Leave them,” said the first, the alien who stayed in the shadows. So he wouldn’t show his ugly face and just let his lackey do all the dirty work. Even as he was writhing there on the ground, eyes watering like mad in hopes of washing it away, Peter knew. That first one was a coward.

“Yondu,” Peter whimpered. He pounded his head a few more times against the ground before he gave up on it. As the burn started to subside, he noticed that if he moved, just a little, just an inch, those stupid needles were poking into his skin again. So he tried to lay still. Very still. Muscles screaming, sure, as long as he was still. “Yondu, come on, man. Come on.”

“They gone?” someone whispered at the back of the cell. Peter hiccupped and rolled over onto his side to get a better look at whoever he’d been locked up with. “Check, Suut.”

“They’re gone,” said someone else. “Ruttin’ slavers. Hey, who has the key this time?”

“I do, I do!” said a smaller voice, and a little Krylorian girl crawled over into the light. Her bright pink skin shimmered, standing in stark contrast to the ratty gray sack she wore, which was tied around her waist by a dingy string belt. She smiled. It looked good on her, that smile. She flashed a row of uneven gapped teeth and reached into her mouth, producing a thin metal rod from under her tongue. “Just a touch. Have you out of that soon as I can.”

“Mind the injection there, Kinamar,” said the boy named Suut. “Remember Hagin?”

“I won’t tear out his throat,” said Kinamar over her shoulder. “ _If_ you can promise to just shut. Up. Suut!”

“Okay, okay.”

Kinamar smiled down at Peter again. He couldn’t guess if she’d lost her teeth natural as he did, or if maybe they’d been removed by a fist. Maybe something worse. But she had a quick and easy smile, something naturally bright about her. Peter didn’t flinch when she crawled over him and started fidgeting with the contraption there on his back. She even produced a dirty rag from the inside of her sack-dress and wiped his face. It stung, sure, but it stopped it from burning any worse. All that was left was a little trail of heat and a bad ugly welt on his cheek. That was nothing compared to the stupid thing on his back. Kinamar hummed a little and worked the rod around like she was picking a lock. It was a neat trick. Peter almost wanted to learn it, but he was more pressed on getting the damn thing off before he asked about how she was doing whatever she was doing.

Finally there was a little pop sound and Peter’s hands were free. He collapsed more freely, stretching his back out on the floor as Kinamar finished undoing the part around his neck. She was quick and soon had the thing off completely. It snapped up into a tight coil on the ground there. Peter eyed the thing and saw it had a long column of black metal plates, like a spinal column, and the needles that had been in his collarbones looked like spider legs. The whole thing had wrapped itself in a swirl like a metal cinnamon bun. Suut jumped out of the shadows and grabbed the machine, turning it over in his blocky yellow hands. He checked it once, twice, before he chucked it to the side with a little “cht” sound.

“Well you’re bleeding,” said Suut without feeling. He was a larger Aakon boy with a punched in piggish nose and dark shaggy hair.

“Not much, though,” said Kinamar, peeking over him. One of her fingers dug into Peter’s shoulder and came up red. He hissed out a sound, flinching back, but she didn’t seem to mind a bit. She blinked her big purple eyes, fascinated. “A _Terran_. For real! Look, Tuntri, look! Now we’re two pinks against you guys, huh?”

“I’m not _pink_ ,” Peter said, his voice hoarse from the strain of being locked in the contraption. “ _You’re_ pink.”

“Oh, you’re pink enough. Just been little ol’ me with these three.”

Suut dropped to the ground, his shoulders rounded as he sat half between the shadow of the back of the cell and the gridded light overlaying Peter and Kinamar. Peter knew another Aakon on the Eclector. Knew they were one of the bigger aliens who could put him through the wall if they lost their temper. Maybe they would need muscles to get out. If there were other Aakon’s in the cell, well, maybe they had a chance. But Peter squinted in the shadows and saw a small, ape-faced Fonabi there and, next to him, another unfamiliar yellow alien. That made five kids total, himself included. He realized, suddenly, that they were perhaps the only children Peter had ever met in space.

“Okay,” he said. “So, pink enough then.”

“Yeah!” said Kinamar, still smiling wide. She raised her eyebrows once, rippling some of the decorative ridges there on her forehead, before she pressed the metal rod back into her mouth to hide under her tongue. It seemed to fold onto itself so it was barely the size of an earthly tic-tac. Peter wondered what it must be made of. “I’m Kinamar.”

“I got that already,” said Peter as he gingerly touched his face. “Suut, I think. You’re….” He pointed over at the Fonabi.

“He’s Tuntri,” Kinamar offered in a stage whisper. Her words were only a little garbled now that she was holding the metal rod again. “And the silent one back there? Hagin.” She sliced her finger underneath her throat with an unseemly “krrch,” sound.

“Oh,” said Peter. Hagin turned away when she mentioned his name. “So.”

“So? Who’re you?”

Peter looked between them, pinching his bottom lip before he said, cool as can be, “You heard, didn’t you? I’m Star Lord.”

“Star Lord,” Suut repeated back. “You Terrans have stupid names.”

“Oh, right. Suut’s any better,” said Peter.

“That’s my father’s name,” he said, whipping his head around. “And his father’s. It’s a family name. A real family name. I don't care what they say, I am Suut. I am always Suut. But what do you know? Your primitive people don’t have—”

“Boys!” Kinamar stood between them. She crossed her arms and gave them a real mean look. Even though she was small and so very pink, Peter had to admire that she was, well, _trying_ to take charge. Not that she was going to keep it.

“Right,” said Peter and eyed Suut once more before he turned to the others. “So what’re we doing here? How long’ve you guys been here?”

“Not long,” said Kinamar, back to her easy smile. “Hagin was the last one, y’see, but I was _right_ before him. And then Tuntri. Little little Tuntri.”

“Don’t say it,” said Tuntri. “You a little. I’m _older_.”

“Fine,” said Kinamar. “He’s _older_ , then. But it was Tuntri before me. Suut was first. Suut says, well, he says there were even _other_ children in here, right, before we were all picked up? But I never met them and he won’t even say.”

“Doesn’t matter,” Suut said from his side of the cell. “We’re all supposed to go to the same place.”

“What place?” Peter asked.

“Same place,” Suut answered without any help. Peter clenched his teeth, biting back a response to the angry Aakon boy.

“Okay,” he said and pushed out a big puff of air. “Okay. Well…okay, but who picked us up?” He held his face again. “That ugly guy was, what, he was a First Mate or something? Who’s in charge? Who’s the man in the shadows?”

“D’spar.”

They answered in unison, sharing the name like an ominous threat. That it held more weight than Peter was aware. He shrugged a shoulder, the one that was leaking just a little less than the other, in a _so what_ answer. The name meant nothing to him. Only thing that mattered was getting out of that cage and getting back to the Eclector. He’d throw himself at Yondu if it meant he wasn’t going to wear that handcuffs contraption again. He’d do anything and everything Kraglin ever ordered him if it meant the Haderfasti wasn’t going to burn another line across his skin. Hell, he’d shoot a thousand Orlonis all up in a row if it meant he was getting off this damn ship.

Peter didn’t say it, cause it meant too much, but he missed the Ravagers. He crimped his fists inside his leather coat. No Ravager flames, sure, but it was red. It was real. And even though Kraglin chucked it at him like it was nothing, it meant something.

“Okay,” he said at last. “So. How do we get out?”

“Out?” Suut pursed his lips and flapped the words away. “First off, you don’t.”

“Oh, come on. There’s gotta be a way.”

“That’s a bad case of hope you have there. D’spar's mate was right. You know how much the rest of us are worth?”

“Worth?” Peter asked. He’d never been introduced to the galaxy’s nasty slaver trade. He knew about bounties. Bounties for criminals. But kids weren’t usually on the bounty lists. So the fact that any of them had a price just went right over Peter’s head.

“Yeah. Tuntri here is 3.5. Hagin? How much’re you worth? 3? 3 _billion_ units. 3 billion even after he got his throat sliced. So you know they were going to ask for more. You’re just a Terran brat and you’re not worth it to them. Don’t care who you think is coming anymore, we’re stuck. We’re too valuable, you see. D’spar’s men wouldn’t let us go for all the units in your homeworld’s vaults.”

“Whatever,” Peter said. "Like my home even has units, you yellow jerk." He pressed a hand onto the hot wound on his shoulder, keeping it there as he looked out through the bars.

D’spar’s warbird was dark. Way darker than the Eclector, which always seemed to be running on those low emergency orange lights. There were blocks of white where an overhead illumination scoured out a piece in the dark, but that was about it. Same dirty floor stretched out from one side of the long room to the other. There were a few other crates and cages, as far as Peter could see, but nobody inside them. Some had chains dangling overhead. Others were left in a crumpled mess. Peter held out his hand to hold onto one of the bars so he could press his forehead as close as he could and get a better look around the edge of the cage. Just as he reached for it, Kinamar shouted “Wait!” but he was so close and his skin made contact.

A bright blue lightning bolt arced across the Terran’s skin, briefly illuminating his skeletal structure. It was almost comical, if not for the fact that it fried him through and through. He spasmed from the voltage and shot back into the dark, clearing the entire cell in one giant forced leap. His back smacked the metal wall there, zapped again by the same electrified bars before he fell flat on his chest. No room for stars. Just instant searing light and then, wham, darkness. Peter thought he could hear someone shouting. Felt like their voice was clear on the other side of the galaxy as he shrugged away from consciousness. And he couldn’t rightly say it cause his lips were numb, but he had the ghostly whisper of a word there.

Then, nothing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh where oh where is our valiant blue captain? 
> 
> Thanks for reading. Hopefully the other kids aren't too strange. (And I'm sorry for beating up little Peter!)


	4. They Won't Risk the Cargo

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> D'spar has kidnapped Peter and now Yondu has the whole Ravager crew with him to get the boy back. Of course, Peter's been electrocuted, so, things are a little...tense, at the moment.

That’s all he tells himself.

_They won’t risk the cargo. Payment would go down if they did_.

Yondu drummed the armrest of his captain’s chair, his black fingernails dancing in an ever-increasing wave. He was himself slouched over, looking to anybody that he was just sick and tired of the bullshit of having to go after that Terran. On principle, even. D’spar was a thief, a slaver scum bag. They weren’t gonna let that slide! His free hand was resting under his chin, the hairs their already starting to turn silver. Boy aged him, some might say. Weren’t worth the effort, others might say. Best if they just let D’spar take ‘im the rest of the way to Ego and be done with it. But, right then, they’d be lucky to say goodbye before Yondu shot them dead. Wouldn’t even have the mercy of a cauterized arrow through their hearts. It’d be a sloppy blaster shot to the face.

Quill ain’t cargo. And he wasn’t goin’ to that jackass father o’ his. Too many before him that didn’t step _off_ that planet. Too many already run to their deaths by Yondu himself, and….

Yondu pinched his eyes shut, forcing back the thought until it was just another poisonous reminder probably growing a damn tumor at the back of his head.

They all knew the route to Ego’s planet. This crew were the only ones that came with him after Stakar’s banishment. Just a bunch of ugly, beat up, mean-mugged bastards too stupid, too broke, and too heartless to go anywhere else. They were all Yondu’s Ravagers, all of ’em. And whether they had his back or not, at least they made a show of support to his face. They had the whole ship running hot, chasing D’spar’s foul ionized trail through the fuckin’ stars.

Umber and Zu were back in the engine room, helping Horuz coax the engines along. Any odd word that the twins were doin’ something particularly fishy, Yondu gave orders to Horuz to chuck ‘em into one of the exhaust vents. Maybe they didn’t call D’spar, sure, but Yondu wanted someone closer to blame. He just needed a twitch from them, that was it. Might even assuage his conscious just to chuck them into the vents was this was all done with. But, and he would admit this, he really would, those octolops were good with the engine parts. Had a ways about them that was downright magic, like they could talk to the machinery and get it to goose a little extra juice from their effort.

Seemed a waste to send the Eclector when Yondu could hop into his M-ship and sail on ahead faster than the ship. Some might say it was a dangerous depletion of fuel, but he was gonna get D’spar and tear his damn ship to shreds. _And_ he was gonna do it with a crew of bloodthirsty Ravagers to boot.

“They _stole_ from us,” Yondu said to the crew, barking out his orders. “And we don’t let nobody steal from us, do we?”

“No!” the Ravagers bellowed back.

“Then getcher ass in gear and haul, boys! We’re on the hunt. And I want a dead Haderfasti crew by the end o’ this day. We’re gonna put his head there on the hull of the ship and let any jackass in these stars know who we are!”

“Yeah!” they shouted back.

Chest thumps from a few, fists in the air for others. One particularly shiny face, scraped together with blistered scar tissue, roared from the back before he humped off to a gunner station. Taserface had some of the dumber Ravagers scarpin’ a path in his wake.

If he forgot something, Kraglin was already there, making sure everyone was in line. Nav teams at their stations, runners bringing battery packs to and fro, the Doc watching Quill’s biometric read as long as they had it on the data pad before the signal shorted out and they couldn’t get it to come back on. Not cause he was dead. No. No, Quill couldn’t be _dead_. But there’d be every level of every hell to pay if he was.

“Captain,” said Kraglin just on the left side of Yondu’s throne. “Word up from Horuz. Said we might blow out engine four. They was needin’ that pladonium fuse replacement last time we was near Xandar.”

“I don’t care if we gotta patch it with some o’ that Terran _duct tape_ right now. Keep ‘em burning.”

“Yes, Captain.”

Yondu tossed his foot up on his opposite knee, knuckling the side of his head as they watched the stars streak on by. He wet his lips and wondered just exactly how many times he was gonna thread D’spar with his Yaka arrow before it was all over.

*

“Ah, and today we’re serving a rare treat, children. You’ll really enjoy this. I present to you the chef’s latest. Processed protein infused with b’gl’dr bile, side of fuck and glazed in a lovely reduction sauce of you.”

The electrified bars slid up as the first mate dropped a tray into the cage. The greenish cubes jiggled unpleasantly, looking both marbled and radioactive. The Haderfasti slid his long-clawed foot across the cage floor, tapping it twice to get the children’s attention. Kinamar got up like always and walked over, her head bowed as she went to grab their food. When she was in arms-length, the Haderfasti grabbed her face, squeezing both sides of her mouth so she was forced to look up at him. He said nothing. Kinamar shivered, but she didn’t whimper, didn’t beg, didn’t cry. Just held his gaze long enough until he wrinkled the angry slit of a nose that split his face and then shoved her down towards the food.

“You’re lucky,” he said to her back while she gathered up the tray. “Not too many daughters on any of the rosters. Means your _worth_ keeping whole. Just know, pretty little thing like you? Would have put in my own credits if it meant I could keep a Krylorian _pet_. Would’ve been interesting to see how you’d develop.”

The Haderfasti put his foot on her back, resting there for a moment before he kicked. She stumbled to the back of the cage and the bars dropped into place behind her. Didn’t spill their meal, thank the stars. Not a drop.

Tuntri and Hagin held out their hands as Kinamar deposited a slimy cube in each. Suut took the tray when she was done. He sniffed the goop, not entirely sure _why_ he did it every time. He told himself he was sniffing for poison; nobody expected D’spar to be above drugging the cargo. But, and though he wouldn’t admit it to a soul, he hoped that it might smell different. Might smell better.

“Keep one for Star Lord,” said Kinamar as Suut reluctantly scooped up his protein cube and started the arduous task of chewing it. “For when he wakes up.”

“He touched the bars,” said Suut. “There’s no waking up.”

“Oh, there is,” said Kinamar. She went over and sat next to the sleeping Terran they had sprawled out in the back of the cage. She crossed her legs as she did and smiled down at him, sweet and easy as always. He really only did look like he was sleeping. His feet had stopped smoking, so that was a good sign. Kinamar carefully put her hand flat on his chest. It rose and fell, rose and fell, just like it always had. Then she knelt down and put her ear to his chest so she could hear his heart hammering inside. “Terrans must be built for stronger stuff, I think.”

“Yeah. Well.” Suut shrugged again, flexing his bulky yellow arm. “Not _that_ strong.”

“Maybe. Hey, Star Lord. Hey,” she whispered while she listened to his heart. “Hey, gotta wake up.”

The other two boys ate their meal. After a while, Kinamar did too, but she made sure Peter still had a share for later, slapping Suut’s hand away any time he tried to take it.

*

He wasn’t fool enough to say it—and, really, as a man of fewer words, it was almost natural to just bite his tongue—Kraglin thought it was pointless. Maybe he’d jumped to it when he saw the ship signature zipping away from Mondar because, hey, chase is a chase and someone stealing from Ravagers was always gonna rub him the wrong way. But now, standing near his captain, Kraglin felt it was all kinda hopeless. Pete was gone. The Doc’s data pad said such, after those biometric readings stopped giving their report. They was gonna tear the Eclector apart for a dead body as a prize.

Yondu had shifted and huffed a ton in his chair. Draped their casual like. Then sat up tense. Moved to the other side. It was like a weird dance he was performing, all of it stress signals, all of it short of biting his nails like a frettin’ mother hen. Kraglin wanted to smack Yondu upside the head just to reset him, make him reign in all them soft _emotions_ he was emulating. They had some damn fools on the crew. Taserface then came to mind. But even a damn fool could see that his captain was getting worked up.

“Hey, boss, looks like they’ve passed through couple of jumps near GB-772,” said Nurn, one of the nav operators.

“How many?” Yondu’s voice was getting rough, more so than usual. It was like he’d been left on a desert planet.

“How many?” Nurn asked his nav partner, a Luphomoid called Reys.

“Two,” Reys shot back.

“Two, Captain,” Nurn said louder.

“You got an eye on the trail?”

Nurn swiped across his console, skipping too far before Reys had to correct him. They were all running to the edge of their cycles rotations. New crew would need to come up and take over soon. Maybe between shift rotations, Kraglin could convince Yondu to go back to his quarters and shut his eyes.

“It’s there,” Nurn said at last and looked back up at the captain with a dope grin. “Still got it, sir.”

“Gettin’ real faint though, Captain,” said Kraglin.

“Don’t you lose it,” said Yondu, sitting up now, fingers tented under his chin. There was the implied _or else_ in the way his red eyes lit up, his hairless eyebrows twitching. “D’spar can’t go through too many jumps without decompressing. Can’t harm the cargo.”

“Course, sir,” said Nurn, head tilted just a little.

They knew where D’spar was going. This was an old route to them now, familiar territory. Ego’s planet was clear on the edge of the known galaxy and there weren’t many that knew the exact route, but the nav teams did. They had to.

“Captain said not to lose ‘em,” said Kraglin, jerking his chin over to Nurn to do his job.

Nurn snapped back around to help Reys. They were good pilots. It was a good ship. Some of the crew might grumble, might ask why the hells they’re even botherin’ with this damn fool’s chase. Running kids was what got them kicked out by Stakar. Kraglin didn’t wonder, o’ course. He followed his captain true as true could. But that didn’t mean some of them weren’t turning little cogs in their heads or planting a seed there that the captain might be soft on this Terran. Might not be the hard ass bastard meant to lead.

No. D’spar stole from Ravagers. Fuck ‘em all who stole from his captain. The whole thing might be pointless and Pete might actually be dead, but this was important. It just sort’ve chewed up his insides to see his captain hurt and he was sure it was going to end in a bad way.

*

“Take my hand, Peter.”

She had a bright, glimmering claw, a skeleton’s hand there on the hard hospital bed. Inches away, really. Inches. His face was starting to get hot and his eye was already swollen from when Johnny Maren decked him outside at recess. Screw Johnny Maren. Johnny Maren went home with a split lip and a few good kicks to the ribs, that’s what Johnny Maren got. Back home to _his_ mom, like that was even fair. All he had was the hospital. His grandparents. Everybody was there, watching his mother wither, her eyes fluttering painfully up towards the ceiling. What did she see? What did she see that was calling her?

“Take my hand, Peter.”

There was a steady beat, beat, beat. Ringing through his ears. Beat, beat, beat. It was mechanical, clinical, made his teeth ache from the sound of it. He started to cry and screwed his eyes up tight as his grandfather grabbed his shoulders, commanding him to just take his mother’s hand, please, it’s the last thing she wanted. Take her hand!

He can’t.

He can’t!

She had a bright, glimmering claw. A skeleton’s hand. A soft hand on the hard hospital bed. A soft hand resting on the rocking chair, swaying back and forth and back and forth as his mother sat on the porch, looking out at the grassy field behind their house. She hadn’t lost her hair yet, but there was some purple bruising under her eyes. Sallow cheeks. A little sour turn in her mouth before she saw him standing nearby and smiled. She reached for him then.

“Hey, baby,” she said, wiggling her fingers. “Come here. Take my hand, Peter.”

He started running across the porch so he can curl up in her lap. There she can stroke his head and rock them on the wooden chair, letting the world breeze on by. “Oh, my little Star Lord,” she’d say, her voice like music. But as he was running, his hand outstretched, the floor started to get gummy. It started to pull him back, retreating.

Beat, beat, beat.

Retreating.

Beat, beat, beat.

He raised his hand to grab her, unable to yell, but at least he could take her hand, at least that!

He raised his hand, holding up the blaster just like Yondu had showed him. The smoking hole rippling through the air like a halo around his mother’s fading face. Peter puts both hands on it, aiming, ready to fire. Yondu’s hand was there to steady his shot.

Beat, beat, beat.

Yondu’s there to steady his shot, line him up for the halo around his mother’s head, and Peter almost leans back as Yondu crouches near him. He was solid. He was real. He was crouched down on Peter’s level like a big Ravager wall against the rest of the monsters out in space. One hand to help with the recoil, the other gently resting on Peter’s shoulder, patting the red leather of his jacket. The halo rippled and an ugly monster peeled back his mother’s face, laughing through the hole in the tree, laughing with a mouth full of fishhook teeth.

Peter lines up the shot. He aims.

Beat, beat, beat.

He fires.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't know why, but I just keep going back to that "Take my hand, Peter," part, because it just breaks my heart.


	5. Don't Stop Now

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which we must figure out how to get out of a Slaver's cargo hold.

When Peter woke, he did so with the veracity of someone surfacing from water, gasping for air like they thought it might be their last. He rose, a possessed thing, knocking back anything that might be in his way. The other children leapt out of reach. Tuntri even squeaked out a short “ha!” in surprise and weaved his fingers across his mouth to keep quiet. Kinamar was, of course, first to be by his side.

“You’re awake!”

“Ahh,” he answered in a groan, before he added, “I guess.” Peter held his head together. It felt like it was about to cleave in half, thumping with the faded “beat, beat, beat” sound ringing from his dreams. “What. What…happened?”

“Touched the bars,” said Suut as he took his usual spot in the cage. “ _Nobody_ touches the bars. They’re electrified.”

“Yeah,” said Peter with a scoff, instantly regretting it as it lit the inside of his head with another stab. “I figured _that_ much out.”

“But you are awake. That’s a miracle! Is it a miracle for a Terran?”

“How’d you know?” Peter asked, laughed, choked back on the sound as he crumpled.

“Red blood,” Suut offered. “Why so red? Are you made of rust?” Suut scrunched up his face like it was the most disgusting thing he could say.

“Right.” All it took was the quick reminder to start to feel the sting in his shoulders. Peter wasn’t looking forward to the slow assessment of his body. His head was pounding, just focus on that. “ _Right_.”

“Do all your species resist electrocution, Star Lord?” Kinamar asked as she scooted closer to him.

Peter eyed Kinamar around his forearms, unable to keep a faint smile off his lips. It was cute how little they must know about humans. Peter compared himself to Bigfoot and almost, _almost_ laughed again, but was pretty sure he didn’t need that. If they thought he was Xandarian, yeah, that made way more sense. There were tons of them across the galaxy. Peter wasn’t exactly up-to-date on all the politics of the galaxy, aliens, whatever, but he knew that Xandarians were all over the place. Heck, there were tons of them like Kraglin back on the Eclector. Well, no, not _exactly_ like Kraglin.

“I’m special, Kinnie,” Peter said with a cocky little eyebrow wag before he pressed his palms into his eye sockets. “Please tell me we’ve been working out how to get out of here?”

But, without a beat, the Krylorian girl shoved his shoulder and said, “It’s Kinamar,” before she slid over a tray loaded with two gelatinous cubes. “Also, eat first.”

“What the…what is this?”

“Protein supplement with—”

“Just eat it,” said Kinamar, interrupting Tuntri.

The food was about as bad as it could possibly be. Chunky. Sour. Somehow wet with dry pockets of concrete dust. Peter gagged down one cube, lurching a few times as he almost emptied his stomach before it was gone. There was no way in hell he’d try a second one. Suut asked if he was going to finish it, but Peter waved his hands dramatically, still green around the edges. Suut grabbed the cube and pushed it into his mouth, chewing with gusto, breathing a few times between his nose before he swallowed without effort. How many of those meals had he tucked into that he could chow down like that? Peter honestly didn’t want to think about it. Instead, he tried licking some of the flavor off by scraping his tongue across his palms. He shuddered at the salty taste. Now, above else, they needed to be out of the cage before next meal time.

Mindset in place, he started to stand, looking around for anything that might help them escape. He stumbled as the bruised bottoms of his feet rioted through his pain receptors and he was down, slapping the floor until it subsided.

“ _Whyyyyyyyyyy_?”

“Touched the bars,” Suut offered.

“Okay, dude, not helping!” said Peter on his hands and knees. “Got anything else?”

“I do not, no.”

The steady clack of sharp claws on the metal floor interrupted them as D’spar and his first mate came into the long cargo hold. The children in the cage dropped back into the shadows, even Peter, who was practically dragged back by Kinamar and surly Suut. The first mate was standing out front per usual, leading a young man already hooked up in the handcuff contraption. He was a pale blue, scaly, and appeared older than the other children in the cage. The first mate dealt his usual spite, muttering low threats into the teenager’s ear before he stopped in front of their cage.

“Put him across,” said D’spar.

Peter tried to crawl forward so he could finally get a look at the Haderfasti captain. Just as he started to move, Suut clamped down on Peter’s ankle. Peter twisted, shot Suut a look, but he could see that the Aakon was wide-eyed. More than that, he was terrified. So Peter sat back on his haunches, waiting.

“Too big to play with the others,” said the first mate sadly, pursing his lips. He flicked a control panel and the cage across from them opened. The teenager bowed his head and stepped inside without so much as a backwards glance. Not that he could afford it with those spikes close to his neck. The first mate seemed to find his meek compliance annoying. He scoffed and gurgled up a particularly wet wad of phlegm and hocked it at the boy. The Haderfasti spit found the teenager's face, sizzling on contact. The teenager bowed down, breathing hard, but he would not look up.

“I hate orphans,” said the first mate back to the shadows. “They’re always so _compliant_. How old’re you, anyways? Figured shit like you would put up a fight or something, but _noooo_. Pathetic.”

The first mate ducked into the cage and slugged the boy once in the face, again in his guts, a third time to his ribs for good measure. When the teenager crumpled, the first mate clicked his handcuffs and retracted the contraption with a quick snap. There was an errant kick to the orphans head as a passing thought.

“That’s enough,” said D’spar.

“Yeah,” said the first mate to the ground.

He sniffed, snorted, and played with the metal roll by tossing it back and forth as he came out of the cage. The metal coil leapt up in an arc, back and forth, like tossing a ball. He punched the control panel again so the bars slid back into place. One more sequence primed the bars. Peter could hear a faint thrum in the air as the other cage lit up with electricity.

“Play nice, children,” said the first mate over his shoulder. “Your new friend there was our last pick up before we get you all to the drop off. Good riddance, too. Can’t even f….”

D’spar and his first mate had walked out of the cargo hold. A metal door creaked shut after them. Once the click-clack of the lock tumbling into place announced they were alone, Peter scurried over to the front, careful to not touch the bars.

“Hey!” he shouted over to the other cage. “Hey, you alive?”

“No,” the teenager answered very quietly. His breath shuddered through his ribs, and he offered, again, “No. No.”

“Hey.”

Peter tried to get back up on his feet again. Wasn’t an easy task by any means, but he wasn’t some weak little brat. He had to put up a lot already with the Ravagers. He just chewed down on the side of his cheek until the worst of it subsided.

“No,” the teenager said louder.

“What’s it like out there, huh? They brought you in. Did you see the layout? Are there any space ships? Any M-ships?” He turned back to the others. “Right? Do you call them M-ships? We have M-ships. You know, I don’t even know what else they would be? And they don’t even look like saucers, which, like, what’s that then? No, right. Right. Anyways, where’d you come from? What’s your name? Do you know where—”

“NO!” the teenager yelled. He rolled over and threw himself forward. Peter yelped out a warning, but the teenager rushed the bars, his face slammed right up against them as he bared his teeth. “Shut. Up. I don’t know. I don’t know. Stop asking me useless questions.”

“Wait, you’re—”

“This is life, you stupid boy. You get where you are?”

“How are you—”

“Aun Above, if you ask another question….”

The threat went flat from there. There wasn’t anything he could do, so he sagged against the bars of his cage, tossing his arm up to get a grip as he rolled his forehead back and forth across the cool metal.

*

One moment, Iuti is kicked out of the One Alcove to live a beggar’s life on the street, the next he’s stolen by slavers and raced across the stars. That was his fate. That was his life. He knew he’d earned it after he failed his first serving for Aun Above, but he always figured the mothers at the One Alcove would give him _some_ leeway. How devote did one have to be to stand in their grace? Iuti sunk lower before he turned his back on the other children and held his knees up to his chest.

But they didn’t shut up. No, in fact, that one auburn-haired boy was muttering, talking fast to his hidden companions. Iuti banged his head a few times on his kneecaps. This is what happens. This is what happens when you don’t serve and you let the faith slip away.

“Please,” Iuti muttered, holding his face. He turned around and saw five children standing at the edge of their cage. Iuti crossed his arms, staring at them, taking in their shapes as one studies different animals. “Ah.”

“Touch your cage again,” said the boy.

Iuti squinted, his eyes narrowing down into slits. He uncrossed his arms and raised a hand, letting it hover there. Then, slowly, deliberately, he grabbed the metal in front of him and held on.

“There,” he said. “Happy?”

The children turned around in a circle, talking conspiratorially to each other. The cargo hold was long, but they weren’t far from each other and Iuti could hear them clearly.

“Well maybe it isn’t turned on or something?” said one.

“You saw it was turned on, though,” said another, a Fonabi boy with pale yellow skin. “We all did.”

“Okay, well, did it short out?”

“No, I don’t think so,” said the Krylorian girl. She looked over, her eyes skipping around the frame of Iuti’s cage, looking for _something_. “I think I can hear it still?”

“I can,” said the other boy. Xandarian by the look of him. “I mean. Well, I mean. No, yeah, I can hear it. It’s on. I think.” He spun around and chucked his chin up. “Hey, d’you know if your cage is still electrified?”

“I don’t,” Iuti answered. He shrugged, and knocked his knuckles against the cage. “Electricity is not a dangerous thing.”

“Ha _ha_!” the boy said and clapped his hands. “He can’t feel it! You can’t feel it, right? He can’t feel it. Okay, okay, so that means he can probably reach up and undo the lock. Hey, can you climb up and touch that control panel up there?”

Iuti looked up at the top of his cage. Yes, if his matched the other orphan’s cage, there was a control panel there at the top with a limited keyboard and a row of primitive lights. Even if he stretched to his full height, Iuti would have to climb the bars to reach it. However, it wasn’t impossible.

“I can,” he answered at last and looked back on the other children. “But why? We’re already aboard the ship. There is nothing to do. This is the way of things.”

“Come _on_. Look, maybe you want to give up, but I gotta get out of here, alright? D’you know what Yondu will do to me when he finally gets here? I’m, like, grounded for a month. Probably. I mean, I was _kidnapped_ , but I don’t think he’d see it that way. Ugh, why do I want to even get out of here?” The boy carded his hair, grabbing tufts before he threw his hands up in the air and looked up again with renewed vigor. “Nope! I’m not staying. So, listen, come on, can you just reach up and undo your lock? I promise, dude, if we can get out of these cages and find an M-ship, I’ll get us somewhere safe, okay?”

“You’re a child,” Iuti said, looking skeptical. “You cannot fly.”

“I’ve watched Yondu pilot. I can figure it out. Just, you know, get us out of here.”

Iuti looked between the other orphans and the lock at the top of his cage. The children were each pleading with him, in their way. The Aakon with his hands on his hips but eyes rippling with fear. The Krylorian shaking her hands in supplication. The Fonabi boy gnawing his lip. The last one, with a large ugly scar cut across his throat, didn’t look up. Iuti felt closest to this one. Their hopelessness was a kinship he could latch to.

But that Xandarian. He was pushing hard.

Iuti sighed as he got back to his feet. The Xandarian-looking boy cheered and he felt himself blush under his blue scales. He held onto the bars and climbed upwards. He had to use his toes to keep purchase and shimmied upwards like he might do to climb trees at the sanctuary of the One Alcove. Iuti’s arms were strong from training for his first serving for Aun Above. Soon he was in reach of the control panel.

“Do you know the sequence?” he asked as he pawed the keypad.

The children talked him through what they remembered that Haderfasti typing, giving him the wrong sequence twice before there was a pleasant ding and the bars disappeared. Iuti dropped to his feet, looking up and down the cargo hold as he expected those slavers to come back and beat him. But the other orphans were cheering, none with more vigor than the Xandarian boy. Despite knowing this was a fool’s errand, Iuti smiled. He trotted over and got to work unlocking their cage.

“Alright!” They poured out of their cage once Iuti was done. “That was awesome! What’s your name?”

“I am Iuti. Who are you?”

“He’s Star Lord,” said the Krylorian, revealing a row of ugly broken teeth. But her smile was sweet.

They finished their introductions as Star Lord started running down the cargo hold, testing the doors on either end just for the sake of eliminating them as an option. Locked. Of course. That didn’t slow him down as they tested each panel in the floor, then started pushing away anything from the walls. Hagin was the one to find a vent that led out of the cargo hold, and he clanged a metal pipe against the floor to get their attention.

“This is _perfect_ ,” said Star Lord as he stood in front of the vent. “Nice job, Hagin. Alright, how’re we doing this? Tuntri’s smallest, so, if you want to go first to lead the way, we can see where this goes. Iuti, Suut? You guys are the biggest.”

“I can take up the rear,” Suut offered.

“No, man, cause I think I should go last. You’ve been in here longest.”

“You should go first, Star Lord,” said Kinamar. “What if there’s something dangerous?”

“Yeah. You’re right. Although, if they find out we’re out, and then they start shooting through the vent? Man, I don’t know how to do this. We could rock-paper-scissors it, if you want?”

“What is ‘Rock, Paper, Scissors?’”

“Right, you guys don’t have that!” Star Lord smiled as he held up his fist. He was about to go into an explanation when the clank of the door lock jangled through the cargo hold. They gasped, staring hard as the first mate entered the room.

“Go!” Star Lord yelled and started shoving everyone into the vent. They crawled quickly on their hands and knees, piling in one after the other. Iuti resisted, expecting to go last. He was the oldest. He was the only one who had any faith amongst them. If someone should be sacrificed….but Star Lord was shoving hard and Iuti went into the vent, scampering across the grimy metal as fast as he could to allow Star Lord enough time to take up the rear. He had put a hand there on the ledge and got his head in before the Haderfasti grabbed Star Lord around the waist and pulled him out of sight.

“Go!” Star Lord yelled again.

There was a grunt, someone falling, and then the shrill wail of an alarm screaming through the spaceship. It made their vital organs shudder.

“Don’t stop now,” Iuti said over the alarm and nudged Hagin forward, hoping the others obeyed. He chanted his prayers over and over, up to Aun Above. Prayers for the children in front of him and the boy fighting behind him. “Don’t stop now.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Listen, D'spar, you shadowy jerk. Come out and join us already. Also, stop beating up Star Lord.


	6. When We Lost the Cargo

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Somehow Yondu knew that Ego was doing *something* with the kids he brought to the planet. Here's a look at how that might have gone down.
> 
> Kraglin does his best to get Yondu to rest while the Centaurian dreams of the last time he ran kids for Ego.

Nothing short of three tranqs and a warm glass of Garigog Ale got Captain to nod off just enough that Kraglin could convince him back to his quarters. It’d been two days now of keeping vigil on the bridge. Nothing impossible by any means, but Kraglin wasn’t going to let his captain push himself on top of being stressed to the point that, if he had hair, Kraglin imagined he’d’ve pulled it all out by then. Even if it were a few cycles, he was gonna get Captain to sleep. Those tranqs were going to make sure of it.

“That’s it now, sir,” said Kraglin, dropping the nearly-dozing Centaurian onto his mattress with a thump. He collapsed there next to him, sitting on the edge of the bed as he found his balance. “I’ll even set you a timer here. Four cycles, how’s that?”

“They took ‘im,” Yondu said, his words already slow. “Took’m from m’ship. My _crew_.”

“I know, Captain,” said Kraglin. He pushed his tongue against his teeth. Best to bite down now instead of sayin’ anything that would rile him back up. “We’ll get ‘im back. He’s crew, just like you said.”

Yondu rolled flat on his back and threw his arm over his eyes. For a moment, Kraglin thought he’d passed out, what with his mouth hanging open just so and breathing a little deeper than before. He nodded once, curt and polite like, and touched his Captain’s wrist. Said to himself he was checking his pulse, but, really, he wanted to feel Yondu’s warmth and let him know, in his way, that he cared. He was about to slide off the bed and go back to the bridge, make sure rotations made it to their stations and the new nav crew knew their orders implicitly, when Yondu’s fingers tightened around Kraglin’s hand and held on. Kraglin whipped his head back to see Yondu staring at him from under the shade of his forearm.

“They took my boy, Krags,” said Yondu. “You know that?”

“Captain, I….” Kraglin searched his Captain’s face and decided, no, this weren’t the time. If he thought Peter was dead—hell, he was absolutely _sure_ of it—he wouldn’t say it. Instead, he turned, positioned himself closer, and put his hand on top of Yondu’s. “I think y’just need to get some sleep, sir. Won’t do you any good if yer dead on yer feet once we’s taken D’spar’s ship.”

Yondu laughed a little, an almost choking sound as his arm fell back onto his eyes. He didn’t jerk his hand free of Kraglin’s. He let his first mate hold on and stroke the top of his hand with an errant thumb, almost unconscious of it.

“Y’know who’ll be dead on their feet?” Yondu said at last, almost a whisper.

“Who’s that, sir?”

“ _That_ sonuvabitch. Only… _half_ of what he deserves.” Yondu’s throat worked up and down, up and down, and he had to take a deep, sobering breath before he said, “Runnin’ them kids. Like I did.”

“Sir, you don’t h—”

But Yondu had started snoring. Kraglin rubbed another circle on top of Yondu’s hand, aware of the slight indents from Peter’s teeth marks. So small, really. Just a little half-moon crop of them there. Kraglin ran his thumb over each mark, counting, before he finally dropped Yondu’s hand back onto the mattress. He cleared his throat, already setting an alarm and resting it on one of the cabinets nearby. It was nestled there between an orange four-legged bauble with big blue eyes and a fuzzy claw creature that bounced on a spring stand.

*

“Don’t this look like her?” Yondu asked, leering over a glass case in one of Xandar’s less-than-reputable warehouses. “With them big blue eyes and all?”

“That there is a Terran toy,” said the dealer, ruffling some of her neck feathers as she smelled another deal falling into her lap. “Rescued it from a Junker out near the Midnight Nebula. It’s a lovely collectable, Udonta, really one of a—”

“You ain’t listed a price yet,” Yondu snapped. “How much you begging for this little critter?”

“Yondu, my love,” said the dealer, batting her lash-less eyes like a regular fan dancing queen. “You know I’d sell it to you for a steal, darling, a real bargain after what you’ve brought me.”

“She’s full o’ crap,” Yondu said and waved his hand, signaling to Kraglin that they were to walk. “Come on. I wanna hit up The Steel before we ship off. Got a real itch for some—”

“500 credits,” the dealer yelped. “500 credits, Udonta, not one less. It’s a collectable, I swear.”

“500?” Yondu raised his hairless eyebrows, assessing the number as a knowing smile shaped his face. He composed himself before he spun back around. “After you done told me this came from a Junker. I know you might have an opinion of me, Lissta, but I wasn’t expectin’ it to be so damn lowly.”

“500 is a reasonable price,” she offered. “I don’t _have_ to sell it to you.”

But it was clearly displayed in a glass case, set up with a light and everything, like a damn beacon. The dealer wouldn’t get shit from anyone else. She knew Yondu had a weak spot for baubles and such and hoped to squeeze a few extra credits out of him, to bargain over the price of the shipment they’d already brought in.  

“You’re right,” he said and swung around, sauntering off for the doorway. “Come on, Kraglin. The Steel is singing my name.”

“450!” Lissta shouted. “No? 415. Come on, Udonta. That’s robbery right there and you know it.”

“And, wouldn’t you know, that’s exactly why you went and hired my crew,” said Yondu, returning to collect his prize.

The toy was for the Mobian girl they were running on to Ego. Captain saw the little orange toy and immediately thought of her. He already had a few other collectables he was set to bring to the other boys and girls of Ego’s prodigious line. The little Mobian and her friends—three others for this run—were set to inhabit a planet now with some twenty brothers and sisters. Ego was a man who liked to plant his crop on any old planet. Kraglin wondered if they were ever gonna run out of children from the roster list provided to his captain.

 “Don’t know why you keep grabbin’ toys and whatnot for ‘em,” said Kraglin as he marched in line. “Seems like a waste of useable income when you and I both know that their dad can give ‘em the world. Hells, he _is_ a world.”

“You questionin’ my own motives then, Kraggles?” Yondu asked with a flippant wave of his hand. Weren’t the first time he’d used the nickname, but it was still fresh and it made the Xandarian’s face blush a shade of blue.

They weren’t presently in the company of Yondu’s Ravagers, so his captain didn’t poke his neck through with the Yaka arrow for trying to undermine his authority. It was a rare privilege to share these moments.

“Nah, sir,” said Kraglin as he hopped back in tow. “Just, y’know, askin’.”

“We don’t hurt the cargo. And we don’t have to shove ‘em into a closet and be done with it. So what if I buy a toy or two. Just means they’ll have a smile on their faces when they meet their daddy. Means we get better pay, what with bein’ so careful and all. It’s business, Kraglin. And business is the only place I take my pleasure.”

They were outside The Steel, a seedy establishment with plenty of interesting wares to try. Kraglin knew there would be three or four women sent up to a room for the Ravager captain. Kraglin himself was already eyeing one of the hooker-bots swaying near the breezy window there.

“Well, maybe business ain’t my _only_ pleasure, then, Kraggles.”

“Aye, Captain.”

*

“It’s a fuckin’ crawler!” Kraglin jerked the controls as they made the M-ship zip through space, twirling a cyclone of debris away from the firepower of the ship that tailed them. “Can’t get a good read on it, sir.”

The ship bucked to the side, almost tossing Kraglin from his copilot seat. Yondu punched up his controls and took over. They raced away from the small ship that had come out of the stars like a dart.

“Don’t need a good read, damnit,” Yondu said, bracing himself as he maneuvered the M-ship through another evasive dive. “Just need a sight long enough to shoot ‘em down.”

“That’s what I’m tryin’, sir.”

“Don’t try, just do it!”

Just as Kraglin had the data pad spread in front of him, frantically typing at a jittery readout of the bug crawler, their ship was blasted from behind. Kraglin flew forward and cracked his head on the console, his vision awash with blue. He was quick to cover his eye and pressed against the wound on his forehead as he looked around for his captain. Yondu had a good hold of himself. He was busy snarling at the hologram readout of a Haderfasti hailing their ship.

“Yondu Udonta,” the Haderfasti said in the screen. There was a red marking slashed diagonally across his face. Seemed he was the damn leader of whoever was attacking them. “You are in possession of a roster, yes? The one sent to you by Ego?”

“Who in the hells you think you are?”

“How many of the celestial’s children do you have with you?”

“None, far as your concerned,” Yondu shot back. He glanced over at Kraglin, who nodded that he was fine, even as he was trying to find something to mop up his blood. They both knew running children was against the Code, and if word got out, it’d be the end of them. “You got a crawler on our ass and I reckon I should know the bastard’s name what sent ‘im.”

“If you have none, than you are of no use. I can pull that roster from the ruins of your ship, Udonta.”

“You think you—”

But the screen went dead. Kraglin checked the call and saw it traced back to a man called D’spar. He was about to share that with his captain when the ship lurched again, shaking violently as the back was shot. Yondu jumped from his seat to go down but the hatch came off and soon the lower deck was depressurized into space. Yondu howled, literally howled as he reached down for the stairs. Kraglin closed off the deck, already looking for a jump out. He had to get them there, that was it, or else they’d be dead. The last jump that would take them to Ego was only twenty clicks away. They had to limp along and then they’d be safe.

“Captain!” Kraglin barely had a hold of the controls as his hands were wet with blood and sweat. “Captain, we gotta get to that jump!”

“They was down in the hold! Those kids were—”

“They’re gone, sir. Please, we gotta get to that jump or else we’re gonna join ‘em.”

Yondu’s breathing was ragged, strained as he turned back in his seat, staring dead-eyed out into space. The bug crawler was still on their tail. Their shot rocked the ship, inadvertently sending them a little closer to the jump each time.

“Sir!”

Yondu blinked. He took control of the M-ship and piloted them precariously close to the jump. That bug crawler would follow them easily, but all they had to do was get close to Ego’s planet. He reared in their dying ship, forcing it to go just so, just a little further.

When they crossed through the jump, Yondu hailed Ego. A face twisted across the planet’s surface before a light shot out in a clear column and struck the bug crawler. D’spar’s man was evaporated in an instant.

They landed hard. Maybe harder than any other landing the two had done prior. Yondu got out of his seat and caught a hold of Kraglin, making sure he wasn’t damaged beyond repair. Not like the M-ship. After they patched his skull, winding a piece of gauze until most of his left eye was covered, they undid the hatch and fell out of the M-ship without much dignity.

Ego, of course, was there. He came out to the field with his cape billowing behind him, an easy smile fixed on his face, but concern in his eyes.

“That was some landing there,” he said, and raised his arms to appraise the M-ship. “Looks like you boys could use a patch.”

“We lost the cargo,” said Yondu. He couldn’t look Ego in the eye when he said it.

“What was that?”

“We. We lost the children,” he said, louder, red eyes flicking up once. Kraglin looked over and saw his captain’s clenched fist shaking at his side. “Some bastard calls himself D’spar sent a ship after us. Blasted out the whole back end. The kids were. They was down there for protection. Thought it was safer than bein’ up where the real fight was happenin’.”

“You lost them,” said Ego, flat as the land around them. He sighed heavily, lookin’ like a man who’d just been pushed back on a deadline. He closed his eyes, thinking to himself, before he opened them again. “How many?”

“We had four of ‘em with us,” Yondu answered, standing firmer now. He didn’t like how smooth this was going over with the should-be-bereaved father.

Ego did a quick calculation in his head and nodded. “Alright, Yondu. Well, let’s get this wreck fixed up and put you back on your way.”

“Back on our…you just lost—”

Yondu shot his first mate a look, one that said _not now_. Kraglin did what he was best at and clapped his mouth shut. He didn’t know what his captain was thinkin’, but he could see, clear as day, that he was distraught. Not just distraught, but _furious_.

“Beg yer pardon?” Ego asked, leaning forward, a small, jovial smile on his lips.

“He don’t know what he’s talking about,” Yondu said. He planted his hands on his hips, resting them there as he squared his stance. “How long ‘fore you can fix my ship?”

“How long?” Ego asked, his voice bubbling with laughter. “Yondu. Come on.”

Ego snapped and held out his hand for them to turn and take a look. Already the ship was growing, pieces molding into place as though they were being manufactured by ghosts. The M-ship tilted and expanded and soon stood tall, left with only a few scorch marks on the front of the hull where the original cockpit remained.

“That’s some neat trick,” said Yondu.

“Consider it a gift. For all the hard work you’ve done for me,” said Ego. He stood behind them and placed a gentle hand on each of their shoulders. “Now. If you’d be so kind. I’m sure there are others that are looking forward to you _rescuing_ them from their sad little lives.”

“Of course,” said Yondu through his teeth, but faced Ego with a toothy smile. “Thanks again.”

“Any time.” Ego pushed them forward, easy but insistent. “Maybe don’t lose so many next time. They are… _precious_ gifts.”

Yondu nodded and waved from the hatch of his new M-ship. Kraglin stood gawping next to him. He hid his confusion by holding onto his eye, feigning to be weaker than he was. It wasn’t until they were taking off that Yondu swore up a storm, kicking the console in front of him, banging his fist on the controls.

“Sir, what happened?” Kraglin asked at last.

“He didn’t care about them kids at all,” said Yondu. “How many we bring him, huh? How many? And how many on that roster he gave us?”

“I don’t rightly know, Captain, I haven’t—”

“That monster. That dead-eyed cocky bastard! Jackass don’t care about his _progeny._ You see his face? Four kids. We lost four kids today. His own flesh and blood. He didn’t even blink!”

“No, sir, I don’t think he did.”

Yondu chewed on his lips, fighting on the words that wanted to come out. Instead, he pounded his fist on the controls again until it surely bruised him, if not shattering some of the smaller bones there in his wrist. Didn’t slow him down. He just flexed his hands, and stared blankly out at the dead space around them. When they passed the shimmering debris of the bug crawler ship from D’spar, Yondu sniffed, ran a tongue along the jagged edge of his teeth, and then smiled. Smiled like a wounded beast who decided he was going to take the last bite outta whatever was hunting him. Madman smile.

“Who’s next on our roster then?” he asked, low and deadly like.

“Uhh.” Kraglin tapped into the data pad, entering the encryption and then scrolling down a long, _long_ list of names and coordinates. “Looks like we could get that Terran kid. Says here his name is Peter Quill.”

“Terran, huh?” Yondu slunk back into his chair, punched up the coordinates to Terra while still wearing that damn smile.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm a sucker for shy sweet moments between two mean bastards who can't share their feelings.


	7. Missed Connections

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Peter has to face off against the Haderfasti First Mate, the other children are trying to get off the ship, and it looks like the Eclector has finally caught up to D'spar and his men. Everybody prep for battle.

"Let me go!"

Peter struggled against the first mate, kicking wildly at anything that might give him an advantage. Despite his efforts, the Haderfasti held on, squeezing until Peter couldn’t get air into his lungs.

“You. I never thought a low class, primitive species such as yourself would cause _such_ a headache.”

As if on que, Peter snapped his head back and cracked the Harderfasti in the face with the back of his skull. Stars glittered across Peter’s eyes but the arms around his chest loosened and he was able to breathe, gulping down a huge lungful of air. The reprieve was short lived. The Haderfasti growled, a sound that rippled through him like some burrowing rodent and he threw Peter against the floor, stomping him down with his large clawed foot.

“Stop,” he said, holding onto the harsh sibilant of his speech. Of course Peter didn’t give up. He wriggled, squirming underfoot, reaching out for a scattered chain nearby in hopes of being able to pull himself free. The Haderfasti leaned in, putting more of his weight on Peter’s back as he hissed out “Stop!”

No air. No air, no air, Peter slapped his hand on the ground to signal he was giving up, please, no air, no air. The Haderfasti held his ground, watching, waiting, until the alarm overhead wound down and he was left with the strained sounds of the child as his only ambient noise. When he let up, the Haderfasti pulled Peter up to his feet, turned him around so they were faced eye to eye. Peter coughed hard, trying to catch his breath.

“Strong boy, Star Lord,” he said with Peter’s face pinched between his hands. “I expect it’s your unique heritage, then.”

“Yeah, well,” Peter wheezed out, his voice a little strained. “you should see some of the guys we got. We got bigger things back on Earth.” Peter coughed again, but the Haderfasti wouldn’t loosen his grip. “You ever heard of a crocodile?”

The Haderfasti laughed.

“Y’know,” he said, his sharp eyes going up and down Peter in a naked assessment. “I’m glad we don’t have to sell you. Petulant child. You’d be a hard mark. Probably have to post you at a bargain to a battle ship.” He dropped his fist, which had been poised to knock the boy out if it came to it. “D’spar says not to hurt the cargo. But this? An alarm? I know you’ve created some unsavory circumstance. You’ll tell me where the others have gone. You’ll tell me, point them out by my side. Then they won’t trust you.” The Haderfasti reached around to grab one of the handcuff rolls clipped to his belt. It dangled there, clanking against a plain dagger hilt and the holster to a compact blaster. “You betray them before you betray me, boy, or else there will be worse to come. I can still take a few limbs.”

With his hand on the handcuff contraption, Peter jerked his face free and lunged, grabbing for the blaster there on the Haderfasti’s belt. He was quick, relying on his height as he snatched the edge of the blaster, felt it tug free of the holster, and rolled. Peter cleared the first mate’s grasp. He was on his back, the blaster trained on the Haderfasti’s face. That big, nasty mouth peeled back, a big screaming hole of fishhook teeth, and, despite his _one_ goddamn day of a lesson, Peter closed his eyes as he squeezed down on the trigger.

A bright white light zapped through the Haderfasti’s face, spreading veins of lightning through his nervous system. The stupid blaster only had a stun round in it. Peter rolled to his feet before there was any time for the Haderfasti to recover. The route to the vent was blocked. Seemed best to just head for the door and hope for the best. Peter slammed his hand on the butt of the blaster, desperate to get a more deadly round prepped as he started for the open door on the other end of the cargo hold. There was a setting. Yondu had showed him on his Ravager blaster, but Peter’s mind was blank as he focused on finding the others and getting out safely.

*

So many lights. Flashes over their heads, in the walls, across the panel of weaponry, the cannon stations, the blaster stations. On the back of a bioluminescent woman with too many scars racing across her exposed flesh. It was dazzling. Bright like the face of a god. Painful like the faith he demands.

“They are going to war,” Suut whispered. His hand was clasped around the small Fonabi boy’s, who held onto the mute Hagin. They were a train of terrified children. “Someone has come. Do you think it is Star Lord’s people, then? Like he said?”

“I don’t care,” Iuti answered, though he did feel a little ping strain the muscles of his chest. If Star Lord had people, perhaps the other orphans could escape with him. “I care about getting a ship.”

“You said you couldn’t fly,” whispered Kinamar.

She was closest to the edge, peeking out at the hangar bay below them with her fingers wrapped tight around the lip of the vent despite Iuti’s protests. So far, nobody had seen her, but all it would take is one pair of eyes to out them.

“I am the eldest, yes?”

“I don’t know,” Kinamar answered truthfully.

“I am. So I will figure it out. If Star Lord can fly, so can I.”

They both knew that was a lie the moment it came out, but said nothing. Better to pretend. Better to have faith in something good then to stay in the cages and wait for something worse.

Many of the slavers were scrambling as the alarm came on and off. No announcement over the ships audio system. Iuti inched forward and tried to see through the low bank of windows that tore through the other side of the ship. There were only stars and some light trails of a bug crawler ship propelling towards an unseen battle.

“Will they take them all?” Kinamar asked. Her chin was getting higher, so Iuti grabbed her and brought her back into the ventilation shaft. “Hey, I want to see! I want—”

“Quiet,” Iuti and Suut said. They shared a knowing glance, Suut annoyed, Iuti exasperated.

There was a large man now taking up the center of the hangar bay. He stood above the others, his hands clasped gently at the small of his back. The other slavers quickly fell into a military line at the sight of him. A hush befell the crowd as D'spar addressed his men.

“You pause,” he said, slowly marching down the line. “When you see the face of an enemy ship out there.”

“Sir, we was just—”

“You _pause_ ,” he said again, facing a man twice his size and girth. The other man shrank when his captain turned on him. “And now there are _low lives_ preparing to board my ship.”

“Sir. I thought ya might—”

D’spar extended his arm in a fluid, graceful arc that slashed clean through the other man’s head. A sword shimmered with black oily blood, extending out from D’spar like his own limb, before he stepped to the side. The giant fell like a tree cut at the base of its trunk and the top of his skull tumbled away with three wet bounces.

“Do not think for me,” he said and wiped the blade of his sword across his exposed forearm before it retracted back into an extendable sheath strapped to his wrist. “Do not pause.”

Everyone scattered. They leapt to their bug crawler ships and slipped through the energy field that separated them from the vacuum of space by a thin film of yellow light. D’spar continued his stroll through the hangar bay, watching everyone with a quiet composure that chilled to the bone. A woman skirted to his left and he grabbed her, nearly breaking her arm when he did.

“Wait,” he said. He tilted his head down to acknowledge her. “My men are there on the Eclector. Hail them. Find out if they have the roster.”

“Who?” she asked, but quickly snapped her free hand up to a salute and bowed. “Aye, Captain. I’ll get them back.”

“I don’t care if they come back. I only require that roster.”

“Aye, Captain,” she said again.

D’spar squeezed until she whimpered and looked up at him, acknowledging his stare. He held her gaze far longer than necessary before she was released. She went over to a bug crawler ship rubbing her bruised skin before she disappeared into the cockpit and took off.

Soon the hangar was practically empty. D’spar watched the last manned ship shoot out into battle. He spun around, facing a shriveled-looking octolops man holding a data pad above his head. D’spar studied it, working the muscles of his jaw as he digested some unsavory news.

“Do we know where they are?” he asked at last, but the octolops just shook his head. D’spar breathed deeply to give himself time to think, his barrel chest expanding in a controlled, deliberate fashion. The octolops muttered something and D’spar bristled. “And where is he, then?”

When the octolops shrugged, tapping frantically at his data pad, D’spar extended his blade and scored it through the octolops head. D’spar was out of the hangar bay before the octolops stopped feebly pawing at the gash cored from his face.

“Aun Above,” Iuti whispered breathlessly behind his hand. He felt someone squeezing his forearm and looked down at Kinamar. She didn’t say anything. She _couldn’t_ say anything. They were all too shocked to form a thought besides their own imminent doom. “He won’t find us,” Iuti said at last and nodded at them in turn. “He won’t.”

Iuti looked out again, assessing the quiet room ahead of them. There were a few bug crawlers clear on the other side of the hangar bay. Two of them were in pieces, others hooked up to too many hoses to count. But there was one at the end. Old. Beat up. As far as he could tell, the ship was intact. Perhaps it was their only chance. “You see that ship over there? We will take it.”

“That won’t _fly_ ,” said Kinamar, who was now on the verge of tears.

“Yes. It will.”

“But. But what about S-S-Star Lord?”

“No tears now,” he said instead, and brushed his thumb under her eyes. “Not now. Come. We get to that ship and we get out alive. That is what we focus on.”

“Do you think he made it?” Suut asked, none too pleased with the situation either.

“I don’t know,” said Iuti. He already had Tuntri wrapped around his neck and tugged on Hagin’s hand to get him ready to run. “Maybe. That is behind us. We are going forward.”

“He did,” Kinamar said, trying hard to keep her lip from trembling. “He was strong, wasn’t he?”

“He touched the bars,” said Suut, more to himself. “Yes. He _was_ strong.”

“Don’t.”

“Both of you, stop it,” said Iuti, before the Krylorian girl flung herself at the Aakon boy. “We can bicker when we’re on that ship, yes?” He looked between them. “Yes?”

Suut narrowed his eyes, but he was already pushing himself out of the vent. That was answer enough.

*

When Yondu charged back onto his bridge, his head poundin’ like it was a nail and the air around it was a thousand hammers just going to town, he threw the buzzing alarm as hard as he could at the back of Kraglin’s head. It hit true. Kraglin held onto the stinging welt that was growing there, wheeling about to see who’d done such a thing before he locked eyes with his snarling captain.

“Sir, I was ‘bout to—”

“—get out of my damn chair, I suspect,” Yondu answered, and nearly threw Kraglin out of his way. “You and I are gonna share words, Obfonteri.”

Kraglin, damn him, he wanted to argue. He did. But there were a dozen or so eyes trained on him, waiting to see how this scuffle was gonna play out. He felt the words bubbling there in his chest, some cantankerous cry of “That ain’t fair, Captain,” but he held onto his tongue, same as always, and took his post there at the right of his captain’s chair.

“Report?” Yondu asked, giving him a steely stare with those blood-red eyes.

“We found D’spar’s ship,” Kraglin said, looking to the floor like a proper cow-towed subordinate, all sulky and peeved. He squinted, pushing down any weird emotion that might bubble, and finally looked up again. “Comin’ up on it now, sir. I was ‘bout to come fetch you, but looks like you’ve done beat me to it.”

“You found it!” Yondu was on his feet, shoving his first mate out of the way as he barked an order to get everyone in their M-Ships. “Why y’all sittin’ round with yer thumbs up yer own ass? We got hell to pay and one of our own to rescue, damn it, everybody _MOVE_! Kraglin, yer with me. Need you to pilot while I’m tearing that fuckin’ ship to pieces!”

“Aye, Captain!” Kraglin grabbed the mic to the ship’s audio and relayed his captain’s message out to the crew. Soon as he was done, he hopped after Yondu and was right in line as they all jumped into their M-Ships.

“Hey, Captain?” came Horuz over the direct line patched into Yondu’s ship.

“Hey, Horuz,” Yondu answered, already flipping his toggles overhead for the engines. “Whad’ya want?”

“If yer all scramblin’, what you want me to do with Umber and Zu?”

“Right.” Yondu snarled at the little speaker in front of him. His teeth looked particularly sharp then. “They done anything funny yet?”

“No, sir. Did everything by the book,” Horuz answered.

“Damn. Whad’ya think, Kraggles?”

Kraglin was finishing up his start-up routine. He paused just enough at the nickname, deciding maybe their brief fight was already in the past. Would be best to stay on good terms after they destroyed D’spar’s ship only to find a dead Terran. He smiled, masking it with a little crinkle in his brow.

“They’re good with the engines, Captain,” he answered.

“I know. I know. Alright, fine. Horuz, keep ‘em with you. I’m still givin’ you orders that if they blink the wrong way, you got my permission to shuck ‘em out of an airlock.”

“Alright, that’s all I needed, Captain.”

Yondu nodded, waved the Xandarian to finish up. Kraglin locked his controls into place, pumping them back and forth, and then dropped them into space. They rocketed off to the big Haderfasti warbird with a whole fleet of Ravagers blanketing the space behind them. Yondu patched through to his fleet’s audio.

“Let’s go huntin’, boys,” he cried. If they just turned their heads slightly, they could see the other Ravagers spread left and right of them, whooping in their ships, throwing their fists in the air. Yondu fixed on his madman smile again as the first bug crawler popped out of a jump point up ahead. Last one what stood between them and D’spar. “They’re quick little buggers. You boys be quicker.” Then he leaned over towards Kraglin for a private moment and said, “Get us through this, Kraggles. I want to be on D’spar’s ship yesterday.”

“Aye, Captain,” Kraglin answered as his captain took control of the M-ship’s gun and opened fire.

 

*

If Yondu was there he’d be proud of one thing, and that was the fact that Peter could crawl into any tight space before one of D’spar’s men found him. He was like an Orloni then, scurrying into the vent system the second he was free of the cargo hold. It was dead end after dead end once he was inside, but every chance he caught a view, he saw men racing around like chickens with their heads cut off. There was some big ruckus going on that got everyone scrambling. All that told Peter was that they still didn’t have the other kids. Meant he had some time to find them and make good on his promise to fly them home.

It was dark for most of the vents and though he was used to it, Peter didn’t have any actual night vision. He comforted himself, humming out a few notes.

“When I die and they lay me to rest, gonna go to the place that’s the best,” he sang, banging his hands and knees on the vents as he tried another route. The song calmed his heartbeat some and even though it wasn’t exactly _easy_ to crawl through a ventilation shaft, he felt he could breathe better when he was singing. “When I lay me down to die, goin’ up to the spirit in the sky. Goin’ up to the spirit in the sky.”

Peter saw a light at the end of the latest ventilation shaft. There was a lot of noise coming that way, but Peter was tired of the dark. He hummed a few more bars of the song, wishing the Walkman was strapped to his side. He figured he’d have enough cover once he was at the end that he could just figure out his location and work from there. Just needed to get to the light. He tried sliding his knees across the metal panels instead of crawling. It was quieter, but it strained his wrists and his knees kept catching on every seam he came across. If he wasn’t careful, he was gonna tear his jeans and they were the only pair he had. Eventually he pulled himself there to the end, looking through a metal grid down at what looked like the hangar bay.

“Ships!” Peter clenched his fists and raised them in a silent victory cry to the air. “Ah, now all I gotta do is find the others and….”

Find the others. He’d been looking for them since he got out. If he wasn’t so turned around, he’d have gone back the way he came, snuck into the cargo hold just to see if the first mate was gone, and followed after his friends. It was the only surefire way he was actually gonna find them. But he was lost. Straight up, plain as day, bonefide lost. It was a dumb, weird enemy ship. Weird ventilation lay out. He hated every inch of it.

Peter slumped down against the wall just as a Haderfasti that looked bigger than the first mate entered and addressed his men. This one was tall, with the same bald snake head, a red line painted diagonally across his face. He had leaner muscles but his clawed feet were huge with curved black nails like a dinosaur. He wore a tight black uniform and there was something strapped down to his right arm. Peter wondered what it was, but was soon answered when a blade extended from it and sliced clean through a huge guy’s head like it was made of butter.

“Do not think for me,” the Haderfasti said, turning away as he cleaned off his sword. “Do not pause.”

Then it was like a bomb went off. Everyone was moving, climbing over themselves to appease the guy with the sword, which was smart thinking. Dude had a _sword_. Peter didn’t think anybody out in space would need an actual, honest-to-God _sword_ , but this guy had it. And he was really good with it too! No wonder everybody was tripping over themselves.

“D’spar, sir,” said one of those eight-eyed dudes holding up a translucent data pad.

“D’spar,” Peter whispered, watching from his vantage point as he studied the Haderfasti’s face, his movements, everything. Then he looked at the octolops guy. “Oh my god, and Umber and Zu were frickin’ _spys_? I knew it, spider-eyed freaks. Okay, when we get off this ship? Yondu is gonna just murder those guys.”

Peter fidgeted with the blaster again, trying to channel a different kind of round into the chamber. He needed something more powerful than a stun round for the Haderfasti captain that had actually _kidnapped_ him, something he was really getting tired of. Aliens and their stupid abductions.

“Do we know where they are?” D’spar asked. His octolops buddy shook his head. Apparently that was the _wrong_ answer. When he told D’spar that the first mate was _also_ missing, that seemed to cement D’spar’s mood. He asked, “And where is he, then?”

When the octolops failed to give a _good_ answer, D’spar put his sword through the guy’s face. Peter watched it coming out of the octolops’s skull and then disappear just as quickly. There was still some twitching as whatever brain cells that were left zapped into overdrive, firing off final goodbyes. But D’spar didn’t stay to watch. He knew the kids had escaped and now he was going to go looking for them.

“Oh my god,” Peter hissed, watching the octolops twitch and spasm, a fish outta water move that eventually ended. “Oh my _god_.”

Peter thought of the other kids crawling around the ship like him. They were all together. Meant they were a bigger target. And they didn’t come from a Ravager ship, so they didn’t even know how to take care of themselves. Suut would probably do something reckless and get stabbed in the head. Or Tuntri would get trampled like a bug. Hagin? Hagin hadn’t shown a mean bone in his body. He couldn’t stand up in a fight. And little Kinnie? Peter shuddered to think.

“Alright,” he said as he held up the blaster he’d stolen from the first mate. “Well. Somebody has to stop that guy, right?” Peter turned on his haunches, crawling back the way he came. He was just gonna have to go find D’spar and kill him. That was the only solution, since he was alone and it looked like Yondu wasn’t gonna do anything. If Yondu tried to ground him after this, okay, there was gonna be some words, alright? He wasn’t gonna just sit down and take that. It wasn’t fair.

“So you know that when you die,” Peter sang in a breathy whisper, crawling as fast as he could through the vents despite his banged up knees and the unwieldly blaster in hand, “he’s gonna recommend you to the spirit in the sky.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Spirit in the Sky" by Norman Greenbaum is the song that Peter's singing, off of Awesome Mix Vol. 1.


	8. If You Want Him, Come and Take Him

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It looks like Yondu has found the slaver ship that has Peter. Ready to take it and its entire crew out, he gets a call from D'spar, who has a little message for the Ravager captain.

“No, no, no no nononononono!” Peter raced backwards as the blade sliced through the metal in front of him, carving out an easy access for anybody down below. There was another swing, and the blade bit into the metal again, this time behind him, arcing across his escape route and soon he was boxed in between two ragged gashes of metal. Peter pulled his knees up to his chest, eyes squeezed shut. He could feel his heart gagging him in his windpipe.

“Get. Him. Out.”

Four or five different set of hands breached the ventilation shaft and started pawing for him, pulling until the little bridge around him gave way and he tumbled out into a crowd of slavers. Peter fired a couple rounds, shocking two aliens nearby. He wheeled, looking for an escape, when D’spar rushed him. The blaster was knocked out of his hands easily. He reached, but it was kicked away before he got sight of it again. As D’spar closed his big hand down over Peter’s neck, he couldn’t help but think that it hadn’t gone exactly as he’d imagined it.

“Here’s what yer gonna do,” Peter had said, sliding around the unbearably dusty vents like a seal going down a sand dune. “You…ugh, is that a _spider_? No. Okay, no, yer gonna find, hm, that coward D’spar, right? Right, and yer gonna, just, yep, just shoot him dead. Like it’s _sooooo_ easy. Probably. In one shot. Oh my god.”

Peter had turned a corner, looking up and down the T-section in the vents before he decided right was as good as any direction. There were a few beams of light shooting up, which meant that the vent must cross over the top of a room and he could check on the crew again. See if he could hear where D’spar had gone. As he started to crawl, however, he dropped the blaster not once, not twice, but three times from his sweaty hands, and it banged through the metal shaft. Peter trembled at the sound, diving after it like it was a lifeline, but nobody made any shouts down below, so he figured he was in the clear. He started to crawl forward again and came up to a grid in the vents. Careful not to actually press down on the mesh and make it fall to the floor, Peter peered down at what looked to be a mess hall. There were dozens of men down there, gathered around tables, trading tales. They weren’t too far down either. If someone as tall as Kraglin reached up, he could probably pry open that metal grate. Peter put his ear to the grate and listened, expecting to hear some gossip. It wasn’t until he was flat on his stomach that he realized everyone was dead quiet.

“There!” someone had shouted.

And that’s when someone started slicing through the ventilation shaft, one-two. That’s when D’spar caught him.

“Now,” said D’spar, who clamped Peter up to his chest. “Hail the approaching ship. I want them to see what I’ve got.”

The sword started to extend slowly from the tech wrapped around D’spar’s wrist and forearm. It clicked as D’spar flexed his fingers, revealing a long shiny blade that he pressed up under Peter’s chin.

“Wait,” Peter whimpered, but D’spar carried him off easily. They went for the bridge to face whoever had the audacity to attack the Haderfasti ship.

*

“Don’t punch a hole through the fuckin’ hull there!”

“I _ain’t_. Yer the one firin’ the guns anyhow,” Kraglin shot back as they looped around to take out another bug crawler flying underneath D’spar’s ship.

“I thought you was some whiz of a pilot,” said Yondu, bucking back in his seat before they zipped around to face off against three more ships. “Thought you could handle a little fuckin’ action and all that.”

“You want action, sir?” Kraglin croaked, teeth gritted as they tore through three enemy ships. “We make it outta here, I’ll show you some action.”

Yondu laughed, a barking sound that revealed all but the very last of his ugly teeth. They were really making fine work of D’spar’s men. Most of the fleet was stuck in the cloud of ‘em back before the jump. Yondu saw pings go through his fleet. Looked like they’d lost a few M-ships, but most were making out like bandits. They were, after all, Yondu’s Ravagers. They’d pop across the jump any second.

“Mm Captain?” asked Kraglin.

“What is it?” Yondu asked, still laughing.

“Looks like that D’spar guy’s trying to hail ya.”

“Shit.” Yondu sobered immediately, taking out another bug crawler as they neared the yellow wall that striped the lower half of the ship. It had to be where they were deploying from. Yondu saw a junk bug crawler slip out near the back, sputtering along with no speed, no finesse, no drive. The thing looked drunk. He cocked his head at it and motioned over for Kraglin to check it out as he pulled up the hologram of D’spar’s mug. “D’spar, ye fuckin’ pile o’ gutwhump shit.”

“That is not how to start negotiations, Udonta,” said D’spar, his face smooth with that hideous red slash going across it. But he stepped back, revealing a terrified lookin’ Terran clamped in place with a blade held way too close to his exposed throat. “Would you care to try again?”

“Pete?” Kraglin whispered, plum amazed that the boy was alive. He almost rubbed at his big eyes, but he was busy piloting as discreetly as possible.

“Ah hells.” Yondu shoved his controls, waving at the screen with a limp wrist. He pursed his lips, but Kraglin could see a vein twitch there on the side of his head. A little flash of red went through his fin as the only tell that his heart was racing fast and he was _pissed_. “You went and got caught, Boy.”

“No, Yondu, look, they stole me, alright? This wasn’t my fault. They—”

“That looks plenty caught, son.”

“Yondu, come on. Please. _Please_!”

D’spar moved his hand, pressing the blade just a little tighter until Peter winced. He was starting to hyperventilate as the blade bit his skin. Yondu leaned forward in his pilot seat and almost bit into the hologram as he said, “Don’t!”

“I don’t negotiate with low lives, orphans, and thieves, Udonta,” said D’spar, standing stone-still as Peter fought to get free. “Much less a man who manages to be all three.”

“Comin’ from a fuckin’ slaver, that feels close to a compliment,” said Yondu, his voice low.

Kraglin watched his captain jerk a thumb towards the listing bug crawler over at the edge of the ship. He coerced the M-ship to start drifting in that general direction.

“You will produce Ego’s Roster. You will send it over, un-encrypted, and you will leave this airspace. That is your only option, Udonta.”

“Sounds t’me like yer askin’ me to leave my boy there behind,” said Yondu as he slung his leg over the arm of his chair. He scratched at the hairs under his chin, scrapping his nails up and down so it sounded like sandpaper. “And we don’t leave Ravagers to no slavers. So, it’s in yer best interest to hand over the boy, D’spar. How’s _that_ fer an option?”

“If you want him, come and take him.” D’spar sneered, wrinkling his disgusting Haderfasti face like that were threat enough. “Destroy th—”

D’spar looked past Yondu, watching a display explode with hundreds of M-ships coming through the jump. They opened fire on the ship and Yondu ended his call.

“Kraglin, wear that fuckin’ crawler there like a hat and get us on that ship.”

“Aye, Captain,” Kraglin answered, and shot off towards the old bug crawler.

They were coming up on it fast and Kraglin was waiting, hands poised to toss them into an evasive loop when the ship twirled around, finally showing the bastards what were piloting the damn thing. Kraglin, set to ram them head on, caught a flash of yellow and pink and brushed the reverse thrusters.

“I thought I told you—”

“They’re kids!” Kraglin hovered in front of them, clocking the readouts of anybody that might drop in. He pointed then at the ship in front of them. “Look! They’re just…they’re kids!”

Yondu sat up a little and noticed three little brats pressed up on the bug crawler’s front window. No lights on inside. A blue-lookin’ kid with scales scattered on his face like pimples was fiddling with the controls, but he didn’t have a damn clue what he was doin’. “Seven hells,” Yondu hissed. He pressed a com call to a nearby M-ship. “Tullk, you read me?”

“Aye, Captain, I can read ye.”

“Cross my way. Got a pick up fer ya. Kraglin’ll shoot you the coordinates, but I figure you can find a place after that. Couple ah stragglers here on the edge. I want ‘em outta this fight, no scratches or nothin’.”

“Read ye loud an’ clear,” Tullk answered, and the line sizzled as the other Ravager took off.

They couldn’t hail the bug crawler. Kraglin tried, but the kids didn’t know which button was which, and didn’t answer. No way to tell them they weren’t gonna get hurt. Not by Yondu, not by Kraglin. That’s all he could promise ‘em.

“What’re we gonna do about gettin’ onboard, sir?” Kraglin asked.

Yondu tongued the back of his teeth, glaring out through the void of space between them and those little orphan kids, each of them lit up by the harsh glow of the M-ship’s headlights. He grabbed a hold of the controls again and said, “Fuck it. We ram it.”

“Don’t much care of it depressurizes their hold, sir?”

“No I do not.”

Kraglin smiled, like he’d been given the world, and toggled all thrusters to ram them straight through D’spar’s hangar bay dividers. Yondu worked his hands up and down the control to the guns. Just as the nose of their M-ship was lined up with the yellow shield, Yondu fired. The blast scorched the divider, another shot cracked it, and then, finally, access as a stream of air blew out into space. Kraglin drove their M-ship through before a backup shield fell into place.

*

The ship shuddered as another volley splashed down from the surrounding Ravager crew. D’spar didn’t stumble once as he carried Peter across the bridge. He had retracted his sword and Peter, fingers prying at D’spar’s corded arm muscles, could finally speak again.

“I told you,” Peter said, even as he was being dragged along. “I told you Yondu would come.”

D’spar raised the boy up to his face, leering at him as he said, “I _wanted_ him to come. I _wanted_ his ship. I have collected many rosters from many weak, low-life captains such as yours. I will have his. And I will have every bounty of every child that is on that list. So do not think this a victory.”

“If you’re so sure,” said Peter, fighting to keep his windpipe open as he was dangled by the collar of his jacket, “then why’re you shaking?”

D’spar’s mouth cracked in a vicious snarl with Peter’s face pressed up into it so that all he could see was a swirl of teeth and tongue and the acidic saliva. His eyes burned and flecks dotted his cheeks. But D’spar assumed too much when he held Peter up, namely that the jacket was properly tailored. Peter pulled his arms up to his chest and dropped to the floor like a stone. He scrambled to his feet and took off, zipping around a tall woman’s legs as she reached for him, vaulting over a console as someone else popped up to snatch him. He saw a door and charged through it. His vision was going blurry and he quickly wiped a dirty sleeve over his eyes, ignoring his stinging skin as he ran, ran, ran. If he could get back to that hangar bay, he just might have a chance to steal a ship and get out.

But his friends. Nobody had said they were found. They still had to be in the vents.

Peter stalled in a crossway, spinning about as he tried to get some sort’ve bearings. He could go back into the vents. Was pretty easy to crawl around them. But if Yondu was attacking the ship, he didn’t have much time. He had to get to that hangar bay and try to radio out to the Ravagers. He had to find the other children. He had to….

“You.”

Peter spun and saw the first mate standing there in the shadows down one of the hallways. His face was scorched, a few lines of singed flesh slashed across his chest and ruining his black uniform. He was hunched over and his eyes were but small pinpoints of purified rage.

“Hey,” said Peter, nice and slow, even as he being stalked.

No time to pick a route, whether it was vents or hangar bay or neither. Peter took off down the hallway opposite of the first mate, running for his life, the loud clack of talons and a particularly gritty roar fast approaching from behind him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I swear, guys, we're getting close to that final showdown.


	9. We Call This a Rescue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Here it is, blood and guts, oh my! Yondu and Kraglin are not messing around and, what do you know, D'spar is sending every idiot he's got to take them out. It's time for the Yaka arrow to come out.

A cloud of dust choked the air as Yondu unbuckled himself. He coughed and waved the dust away from his face. It wasn’t exactly a smooth landing but that apparently hadn’t been their forte after the whole mess with Ego began. Ravagers did like their daring escapades. Kraglin was already up with one of his many knives twirling fast between his fingers. He had a blaster buckled to his side, but that was only for when he couldn’t tear a man’s throat out with his bare hands. Boy had a look in his eye, something between guilt and fury, a manic rush even as the edge of his mouth curled up. Yondu liked what he saw.

“Ya ready to go?”

“After you, sir,” said Kraglin, and pounded a button nearby that opened their hatch.

Just their luck, they had a dozen groups sliding into view as several doors opened along the hangar bay. Whoever stayed behind must’ve felt the breach of their warbird ship and went out to defend their home. Yondu scrubbed his mouth on the back of his leather sleeve as Kraglin leapt out of the way of a shot, the metal scorched black where his feet had been. He went sailing into the crowd, whipping his arms through them as he found a neck, an arm. Any old artery would do, really. There were four already dropping in Kraglin’s wake, clutching at their mortal wounds by the time Yondu had cleared all the dust outta his lungs. He was there on the ramp, watching his first mate practically dancin’ with the slavers. But he wasn’t useless, of course. He couldn’t get himself to whistle, so he reached out and slammed the closest head he could find into the ramp, banging it again and again until it cracked beneath his hand. Someone reached for his forearm, but he ripped a blade from a seam in his coat and put it through the slaver’s throat, tearing upwards until it popped out of his jaw and left a wagging tongue like a necktie.

“Captain!” Kraglin yelped before he caught a slaver’s fist in the gut and fell behind the growing number of bodies.

“’Nough of this bullshit,” Yondu said over the face of a Kree fighting to get Yondu’s thumbs out of his eye sockets. He wet his lips, curled his tongue, and the air split with a high pitched whistle.

There was only the short pulse of red light as a warning before the Yaka arrow zipped through their chest cavity or punctured their eye socket or clipped clean through from one shoulder to the other. It burned a line in the air as it flew through the crowd, arcing in sharp turns as Yondu focused another note and his red fin pulsed atop his head. The fiery trail ribboned around them and it was all accompanied by slavers crying out before they hit the floor. Yondu gave it one last twill and called the arrow back, catching it deftly over his right shoulder and sliding it back into the leather holster there at his side. Anybody left on their feet collapsed.

“Kraglin?” he called, coughing through the name. They’d really huffed a lot of dust during the crash. He was glad he could get through his deadly song before anybody socked him in the jaw or something. “Kraglin, you answer me right now.”

A hand shot up, waving under a dogpile, fingertips stained blue as Kraglin reached for the surface. Yondu stomped on the bodies there underfoot as he went to retrieve his first mate. He pulled him up, hooked an arm there around his waist as they stood on the uneven terrain. No gunshot wounds, far as they could tell, just a few scrapes and bruises. Most of the blood weren’t Kraglin’s. It was a damn miracle. Yondu patted him once on the chest.

“Can’t lose you too, Kraggles,” he said, at least covering his mouth with his fist this time when he coughed again. “Hells, feels like I got batter in my lungs. Let’s get Quill and get outta this shit hole already.”

There was a scream that hooked their attention and they turned just as someone shot into the room. He was beat up, face an ugly mess with a hot red burn crossing from his temple down to his chin. He’d managed to lose his damn coat but he was moving and moving fast.

“Yondu!” Quill yelled. Just then he noticed all the bodies there before him. The Terran tripped and crashed down on a dead man’s back before he turned and threw his arms over his face. “No, wait, I—”

A Haderfasti with no ranking mark painted on his skin leapt out of the dark hallway. He grabbed Quill in a flash. He held the boy up, screaming obscenities until he too got wise to the dead crew around him and focused on the Ravagers that had breached the ship. The Haderfasti clamped Peter across his chest, holding him like a shield over his vitals. He laughed, slow, letting in build up before he was cackling.

“You,” the Haderfasti said, gasping as he nearly buckled in half from laughing. “You idiots! Come to this ship!”

“I’m already sick o’ his tone,” said Yondu as he let go of Kraglin.

“Don’t take another step.”

The Haderfasti reached for his belt, fumbling at the empty holster before he growled and took out a knife. He pressed it against Quill who flinched outta reflex before he rolled his eyes, his nostrils flared in annoyance.

“Oh my god,” he said, quietly struggling in the Haderfasti’s arms. “I am so _sick_ of you guys pulling knives on me.”

“Shut up. Shut _up_.”

“Now, hold on,” said Yondu, who raised his hands above his head. He elbowed Kraglin, harder than he meant, and soon they were both standing there, showing off their palms. “Let’s talk.”

“I am _done_ talking.” The Haderfasti bumped his chin against a com link on his wrist. “D’spar. Down in the hangar. I’ve got one of the boys and the bastards who boarded.”

“So,” said Yondu.

“So,” said the Haderfasti.

Quill wriggled about until the Haderfasti snarled in his ear, lookin’ to all like he was gonna bite Peter’s ear off.

“I would sooner gut you than bother with this whole thing,” said the Haderfasti.

Quill was swinging his legs and managed to say, “Try me,” before he connected his heel with the Haderfasti’s kneecap. It made him cry out but he didn’t let Quill go. He just grimaced, cursing, spit flyin’ fast as he started to pull back into the hallway. They struggled and Yondu dropped his hands, running for the boy as he pursed his lips to whistle and wake the Yaka arrow. But as he did, he watched a slim dagger twirl in his peripherals as Kraglin threw it. He reached for the metal out of instinct.

“You’ll hit the boy!” he yelled, and the world seemed to slow down to a crawl as it went sailing across. Kraglin’s arm was stretched out but his eyes were dead set, determined, fixated on the trajectory. The Haderfasti twisted, pulling Peter up to take the hit, his shirt fluttering up just enough that they could see the soft white skin of his belly.

The Yaka arrow shot out of Yondu’s holster soon as his tongue touched his teeth, pinging against Kraglin’s knife and sailing around with its red tail like icing in the air. There was just a moment that Yondu almost turned it on his first mate, just to show him what his stupid stunt would cost him, but he jerked the arrow and set it after the Haderfasti. It went clean through his leg, lacing around as it tore through the other. The Haderfasti howled, collapsed to his knees, and Peter jumped out of his arms at last. Once he was clear, Yondu whistled the arrow through the Haderfasti’s arms, starting at his wrists, then jumping up through his elbows where they shattered. It was lightning work going through shoulders, punching him through his stomach, then his neck, then a last note sent it twirling around and through his eye socket. Yondu called the arrow back. Even as it trailed red, the Yaka arrow was cool in his hand and he slid it back safe by his hip.

“If you _ever_ ,” started Yondu as he wheeled over towards Kraglin, who was crouched down so he could pick up Quill.

The Terran bowled into Kraglin’s arms and they were up and at it soon as Kraglin had him wrapped up safe. Peter buried his head against Kraglin’s shoulder. The Xandarian rubbed Quill’s back, telling him it was alright, they had him. Yondu stumbled over a few wayward limbs and was by their side, touching Quill’s arm gentle as he could.

“How bad they get you, son?”

“You bleedin’, Pete?” Kraglin asked. He held up his hand to show Yondu the smear of Terran blood on his fingertip. Looked like there were some marks on Peter’s shoulders and the cut on his neck from D’spar still had a trickle to it. “It’s okay. We gotchu.”

“And I thank you for that,” said D’spar as he came out of the hallway, stepping without much care over his dead first mate. An army of slavers took up space behind him, fanning out until it felt like they were surrounded. “Saves me the trouble of looking for him. That _boy_ of yours has a terrible habit of disappearing in the vents.”

“D’spar.” Yondu sneered, staring up at the Haderfasti captain.

“Udonta,” D’spar answered with the slightest of nods. “Are you ready to make arrangements?”

“For what?” Yondu asked. He put his hands on his hips and showed off the Yaka arrow holster, set to let it fly. “That fuckin’ roster you been beggin’ me for?”

“One in the same.”

“Don’t got squat for ya ‘cept me putting a hole through your head. So y’might as well tell yer men here to _back off_ ‘fore I do the same to them as I did with the rest o’ yer crew.”

“You’re an idiot, Udonta,” said D’spar.

“And yer a jackass,” Yondu answered.

D’spar flexed his hand, revealing his retractable sword. The rest of his crew moved in to grab them, but Yondu whistled and quickly threaded through the first round in a cyclone, zipping the arrow down a line so Kraglin and Quill could get back to the ship. Kraglin had set Peter down the second he heard the whistle and was wheeling his knives through the first alien he saw. Someone fired, but the blast missed Yondu by a hair. The three had stepped close into a circle as they were properly surrounded, Yondu keeping a hand on Quill as he made the arrow fly through as many throats as he could. Another blast shot close, singeing his skin. Yondu whistled his arrow through the shooter’s wrist and his blaster clattered close to Yondu’s feet. He focused everything on maintaining a perimeter, which was slowly expanding as the slavers were dropped by either his arrow or Kraglin’s knife work.

Suddenly the ship kilted dangerously and they all had to catch themselves. An alarm ripped through the ship as warning lights blinked on the ceiling. The ship didn’t right itself, which meant they must have lost power to one of their engines. The Ravagers outside had carved through part of the ship.

“We don’t got much time, Captain,” Kraglin yelled, nearly parallel to the ground as the ship kept slowly turning starboard.

Yondu shot a thumb over towards the M-ship, the hatch still left open for them to make their escape. If someone was stowed on the ship, Yondu was sure his first mate could make easy work out of disposing of them before they took off. He never stopped whistling, even with the floor trying to rotate out from under him. Bodies were sliding in the way and knocked against his legs, but he made sure to add to the pile before they were done.

A blade sailed over Yondu’s head. If he had his fin it would have sliced a good piece off, but it didn’t even clip the implant. D’spar kicked Yondu in the chest, knocking him into the pile of dead slavers. He swiped with his blade, trying to carve Yondu in half, but the Centaurian zipped his arrow back and D’spar ducked just before it went through him. He dodged the arrow deftly, rocking left and right, up and down, carving his blade through the air to try and deflect it. His blade wasn’t as strong as the Yaka arrow, but it twerked the trajectory just enough to save his skin. Yondu whistled faster, harsh chirps trying to put the arrow through D’spar. He meant to dice him up more than he did the Haderfasti first mate, but D’spar was agile, attentive. He dived down and just as he was about to thrust forward to stab Yondu and put an end to the incessant whistling, his face evaporated.

Yondu saw the blast before he heard it. It came out of nowhere, bright, brilliant. There was a rough hole scoured through D’spar’s head, revealing smoking meat still red hot on parts of his skull. The blast knocked him back and D’spar was on his knees, going limp at last.

Yondu turned and saw Quill with a blaster in his hands. The boy was breathing heavily between his gritted teeth. His face was stained with tears and his arms were shaking, but he stood firm as he kept the barrel trained on D’spar’s corpse.

“Quill.” Yondu pushed himself up and reached for the Terran, who finally dropped the blaster so he could scrub his eyes as he started crying. “That was good work, son.”

“He…he was….” Peter couldn’t get any words out and held his face in his hands as he cried harder, almost hyperventilating. Yondu scooped him up and Peter wrapped his hands around Yondu’s neck.

“You did good, son,” Yondu said quietly.

“I wanna...I wanna go ho-ome,” Quill wailed.

The ship rocked again, starting to tilt in another direction and Yondu decided they’d had enough fun. He whistled back his arrow and told Kraglin to get to the ship. They scrambled best they could, despite the graveyard of slavers scattered around them. The two Ravagers had to push against each other, stumbling towards the ramp of the M-ship. They grabbed onto the metal beams extending down from the ship before that, too, slid out of reach.

Yondu stomped up the ramp with Peter in his arms. Luckily, there wasn’t anybody on board and Kraglin had the ship up and ready in record time. They were in the pilot seats and out through the hangar bay shield before the final cannon hit completely disabled D’spar’s warbird.

Once they were a distance away, Yondu hailed his fleet.

“Light it up, boys,” he said.

“No, wait!” Peter spun in Yondu’s arms as the Ravagers rained everything they had on the warbird.

“What’s gotten into you?” Yondu asked, struggling to keep a hold of Quill.

“The others! My friends are still—”

The Ravagers shots rippled through the hull of D’spar’s ship. Big plumes of red and orange and yellow bubbled out in pockets and soon there was a white blast of light as the ship exploded. A soft pocket of sound muffled by the enveloping vacuum of space managed to reach them, barely kissing the hull of the M-ship. It was nearly blinding. Peter threw himself at the front window, screaming at the explosion even after the fireball scattered and all that was left was wreckage.

“What in the seven hells? We just _saved_ yer ass!”

“There were others!” Quill screamed. “On the ship! There were kids on the ship, Yondu!” Kraglin was the one that got him, holding him even as he screamed, wailing at the top of his lungs. “No! No, they were there! NO!”

“Pete, we, uff, hey, we—”

But Peter was fighting and he was distraught. They weren’t gonna get through to him. Yondu helped hold down Quill as they brought him to the small bunk they kept up in the cabin after what had happened to those other children of Ego. He thrashed about but eventually exhaustion got him and he just curled up on the thin mattress, crying hard as he held onto Kraglin’s hand. The kid didn’t know that the others had gotten out on in a bug crawler and, if Tulk had done his job, were probably on their way to a civilized planet.

“Hey, yer with the Ravagers now,” said Yondu and tried to put his hand on Quill’s shoulder only for Quill to roll away, curling up on himself. “We ain’t ever leavin’ you behind, son. Yer with us.”

“Yeah, me and Captain, we got you,” said Kraglin, twisting his brow in a quizzical look towards Yondu.

“Even if we do hafta get you a new coat,” said Yondu.

He was trying to make light of the situation, but Peter just held onto his knees and wept until he didn’t have anything left. He was asleep for the last of the trip back to the Eclector. Kid had earned all the sleep he wanted, really. They might even argue kid had earned his flames, but that was something to be gifted later, once things had settled. Yondu was mulling about an old jacket he had that he might have the Tailor fix up as Kraglin piloted them home.

Once they were docked in the Eclector and the rest of the crew had gone off to the mess hall to drink and celebrate, Yondu had Kraglin carry Quill up to the Doc. Alone on his M-ship, Yondu called up Tulk to ask about the other children. There was a nova outpost nearby. Not close, not by a stretch, but it was within reach. Tulk didn’t want to deal with finding a potential bounty on his head, he did work out a deal with an informant that could get the children back home. The Aakon boy had a family he was dire to return to and the Krylorian girl had a mother still. The other three were proper orphans. No home, no family—far as they were concerned, Ego was nothing but a name that the slavers threatened them with. The nova corp was happy to take them. They had an orphanage that seemed good enough, especially when bribed a few thousand credits. Even the blue scaly teenager seemed content. Long as they were safe from slavers, Yondu was happy enough. He ordered Tulk to keep what he’d done to himself, that there’d be a share coming his way that he was earned and time off if he really wanted it, but Tulk just saluted and promised to be back on the ship once he was sure the children were properly settled. After he signed off, Yondu decided he needed to go check in on Horuz and the octolops twins.

It was Zu who had his head over an engine port, scrambling to get away from the fire that was already scorching his head. Umber was begging, <<Please, Captain, spare us! We didn’t know! We—>>

“You _swear_?” Yondu rasped back. He ignored the heat that was starting to blister his own hand, keeping Zu’s head in place. “Huh? You swear, dontcha? What you think yer swearing to? Cause it sure as hell ain’t this crew and it ain’t this ship!”

<<No! We—>>

Yondu shoved Zu down into the engine. He screamed as the heat burned him alive, sending a plume of sparks into the engine room. He grabbed Umber from Horuz’s grip and dumped him in after his brother. He gasped as the painful blister burst on his hand, wringing it out at his side as the two men looked in through the fiery port.

“Shame,” said Horuz, wiping a greasy line across his forehead. “They was real good with the engines.”

“Yeah, well….”

Yondu spit. They had looked rightfully scared up until the end. It sat funny on Yondu’s conscience, but he wasn’t about to keep traitors lying around. Not the ones he could find, anyhow. What was one more death on his hands? Two more? It didn’t matter. Didn’t matter that his skin was scorched. Didn’t matter that those kids were dead.

“Gonna go get that looked at, sir?” asked Horuz, pointing at Yondu’s burns.

“Don’t tell me what to do,” said Yondu, but he was already climbing out of the engine room and headed for the medic bay, only a little miffed he didn’t have the coat yet from the Tailor as a surprise.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think I have one more chapter for this, guys, a little bow to wrap it all up and make it nice and neat. But, hey, Peter's safe! Ain't that something?


	10. Got Us For Life, Kid

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The final chapter, we get to see the aftermath of the fight with D'spar as Peter recovers in the med bay. And, hey, look at that, we got some hand holding goodness.

It was, of all people, Kraglin posted at Peter’s side while he slept. It weren’t surprising to anybody _but_ Kraglin, yet he still held up that it was mighty odd he was still there, waiting through the evening. He’d be the first to admit it wasn’t cause he was soft on him, nothin’ like that, but he figured his captain would have to come by sooner or later. There was plenty of celebrations going on and Kraglin was a little thirsty after all that fighting, but he’d carried Peter all this way, he might as well make sure the little scrapper made it through the night. The Terran had been limp most of the way from the M-ship to the medic bay, but woke up soon as Doc was futzin’ over his face.

“Am I gonna be, like, all scarred up?” Peter asked, trying not to wince as the Doc slathered some translucent blue goop over the burn and bandaged it up with some hydro-fused skin. “Am I gonna look like you?”

Kraglin laughed despite himself and it puckered some of the lines that slashed under his right eye. They were still pretty fresh, all things considered. Would be a time they would fade and might not be the first thing they noticed about the Xandarian, but, he liked them enough.

“Figured you’d be a sight more ugly than I,” said Kraglin and laughed harder, slapping his knee. Peter’s eyes welled up and he started shaking, his lip quivering as a reminder that the kid was just that, a kid. Made Kraglin feel just a little bit sorry about the boy. “Can’t all be as handsome as me, Pete, but, hey, Doc said we got this on you right quick. Probably won’t even see a mark once it’s all healed anyhow. And, let me tell you somethin’, yer gonna wish it had.”

“Why?” Peter asked, rubbing a little at the edge of his face before he dropped his hand.

“Chicks dig scars.”

“They do?”

“They surely do.”

Peter touched the wet-looking plaster again before Kraglin slapped his hand away.

“Don’t go scratchin’ it.”

“Yeah, but it’s _itchy_.”

“So?”

The marks on his shoulders were a red and puffy. Doc said they had a mild infection, but Peter got fixed up quick and once he was laying there in one of the few soft clean shirts they could find in his size, he curled up on his side and was, for a time, quiet as the dead. He didn’t go to sleep right away. Kept staring up at Kraglin like he was afraid the whole ship was gonna disappear on him. Once or twice he reached haphazardly for Kraglin’s hand, but he thought better of it and dropped it back onto the hard mattress.

“Why don’t you close yer eyes and get some sleep?” asked Kraglin.

“Cause,” Peter answered with a sigh. Kraglin didn’t usually go fishin’ for an answer after that like Yondu did, but Peter offered one up anyways. “I was just thinking. About everything, I guess. I’m glad you guys came for me, though. I knew you would, but, I mean, I guess. Still. Thank you.”

“Course,” said Kraglin. “Yer one of us now. Got us for life, kid.”

“Yeah,” said Peter, but he didn’t look exactly happy about it.

“What?” Kraglin finally asked, even though he was sure he didn’t really care. Not _that_ much. Maybe only a _little_.

“Just. Thinking,” said Peter again. He was squeezing his eyes now and again, trying to keep his composure. It was cracking. Hells, it was in shambles. “About my friends, you know, back on D’spar’s ship. I…I….”

Peter pulled the pillow down over his face, his whole tiny body trembling. He muttered something, but it got all garbled up in the pillow. Kraglin didn’t want to know. Didn’t need to know. He’d seen plenty of people die, more by his own hand than not. It weren’t easy to be a Ravager, weren’t easy even to be an orphan back on Xandar, but it was a life he knew. Maybe Peter would come to understand it too, after all this. He’d done plenty to earn a spot, especially after he shot D’spar. So if he thought all his little friends were dead, well, that might just toughen him up some. Might.

But he was crying so and he was just a little thing. He’d lost his mama, he’d lost his family. Well. No. No, he had a family. Maybe now more than ever. He had the captain. Seven hells, he even had Kraglin. And, fuck it, maybe he needed a little comfort. Kraglin dropped his boots off the side of the bed and leaned in, strokin’ Quill’s back as gentle as he could manage. The boy cried harder, of course, so Kraglin scooted himself right up next to Peter, got himself half on the mattress even, and was humming one of them ridiculous songs off Peter’s Walkman. He didn’t know most of the words and he couldn’t carry a tune to save his hide, but Kraglin hummed anyways. He warbled through it and Peter started to huff, taking big deep breaths as the last of his tears were wrung outta him.

“Mmm child,” Kraglin sang, more croaked than anything. He closed his eyes then too and Peter had his head in Kraglin’s lap, holding onto the Ravager’s hand as the other one was rubbing little circles into his back. “Hey child. Dadada da da doot dee doo-oo.”

“Those aren’t the words,” Peter said, his voice soupy with sleep. “Like.” He yawned and Kraglin was careful not to move as the boy settled in. “Like at all.”

“Yeah, well,” said Kraglin, but smiled anyways, humming the few notes he could remember. “Teach me some time, ya brat.”

“Mmhmm,” said Peter, slower still.

Kraglin didn’t stop his awful singing even after he was sure Peter was asleep. There was something soothing about the music, even to him, and he rocked his head just a little as he let Peter rest. He was just the first mate, so if anyone saw it would only be a little fight, a few fists to get some semblance of a pecking order back in place. Wouldn’t be like someone catching his captain with the Terran curled up like a little critter. ‘Til then, Kraglin was almost, _almost_ enjoying himself.

“Boy’s right. Can’t sing fer shit.”

Kraglin started to get up as Yondu came into the medic bay. His already flushed face seemed to gather a new glow while caught coddling Peter, and he was trying to get the boy off his lap before Yondu waved at him.

“Let ‘im sleep,” he whispered.

“Yeah, but—”

Yondu pushed Kraglin’s complaint away, reaching for a chair nearby he could pull up to the other side of the mattress. He plopped it down and once he was sitting, Yondu sort’ve sprawled back, let his head tilt up to the ceiling and closed his eyes.

“Ye look beat, Captain,” said Kraglin.

“Yeah, and if you drug me without my knowin’ again, I’m havin’ you inspect the inside of the engines after those octolops boys.”

Kraglin winced at the thought.

“That’s a mean way to go, sir.”

“Could be worse. Coulda thrown em into the void.”

Yondu stretched his arms up until his shoulders popped, one after the other, and he sighed as everything settled back into place. There was a shiny blister on his hand, but he didn’t seem in such a hurry to get it looked after. Instead, the two were enjoying a quiet moment alone. As alone as they could be without holding up in Yondu’s quarters.

“Yknow, Doc fixed up his biometric reader,” said Kraglin, who felt the need to stretch start tugging at his tendons. He didn’t dare move or else Quill might wake up or, worse, his captain might say something that would get him stuck there for the rest of the evening. “Got him linked up and everything. You can even read it there on the data pad, just like before.”

Yondu only grunted his acknowledgement, but he arched a brow and was reaching for his data pad, scrolling through with an idle swipe or tap until he had a skeletal readout of the sleeping Terran.

“So, I mean, he don’t have to stay here all night,” said Kraglin, sitting up just a little to get a better read of his captain’s face. He added a quick, “sir,” at the end once Yondu finally looked up.

The Centaurian was workin’ on a thought, chewing through it. Kraglin could see him clenching and unclenching his jaw as he settled on whatever it was he wanted. He nodded once, stood, and tucked away his data pad before he reached out. He flapped his hands a few times before Kraglin understood and carefully lifted Peter up into Yondu’s arms. The boy settled instantly, only made a small whine of protest before he was fast asleep. The old familiar smell of leather and grease and grime seemed the only thing Peter needed then, and he smiled a little as he curled a limp fist on Yondu’s back.

“C’mon then,” said Yondu.

Yondu reached out to grab Kraglin’s hand too, wrapping their fingers only briefly before he headed off to his quarters with Peter practically wrapped up inside his coat. Kraglin swiped a little tub of that burn gloop off the table where Doc had left it for Peter. He’d spread it onto Yondu’s hand once they were back in the room. Till then, he tucked it into his jumpsuit and stepped in line behind his Captain. They didn’t have to worry about none of the others tripping in their way. Most everybody was either asleep, off on a mission or, more than likely, drinking and fighting and drinking some more back in the mess hall, more power to ‘em. Kraglin wanted to risk grabbing Yondu’s hand one more time, just to hold it, just to be there, but he’d wait until they were back in the room to try it. He weren’t stupid.

“So,” he said to break the silence on their little trek, “what you reckon we’re gonna do with Quill now we ain’t runnin’ him to Ego?”

“Dunno,” Yondu answered, not unkindly. The thought hadn’t occurred to him, not fully, since he was so busy just getting Quill back on the ship. But he recalled something that D’spar said and it made him smile. “Remember how they were bitchin’ about how Quill was gettin’ in their vents?”

“Sure,” said Kraglin. “I can imagine. He’s small, anyhow.”

“Yeah. Good for thievin’, I s’pect. Good for gettin’ into places we can’t.”

“So, what? We train him on picking pockets?”

“Yeah, but I’m not trustin’ anybody else to help me with it,” said Yondu, a glimmer of red through his fin. “Don’t need no extra eyes for someone so small.”

They could feel the steady thrum of the engines vibrating through the ship, its blood, its heartbeat, the very soul of the Eclector. Made the whole thing feel like home. Kraglin smiled as they came up on his captain’s quarters and said, “No, I don’t think you do, sir.”

Yondu pressed his burnt hand up on the biometric sensor, where it flashed up his palm. Even with the fresh new marks they didn’t muck up the read and the door pinged and slid away. He carried the boy inside easy as can be, but before he disappeared in the dark of his cabin completely, he grabbed Kraglin’s hand again and dragged him in after. The door closed with a soft hiss, locking behind them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ah, yes, the final chapter. But, don't look too sad, I've already figured out the next story for Kid!Peter and everybody else. Hope you enjoyed and thanks for reading!


End file.
